


A Robin Redbreast (In a Cage)

by onawingandaswear



Category: Hannibal (TV), Hannibal Lecter Series - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Cannibalism, Canon Typical Violence, Chilton gets a chance to study Will, Developing Relationship, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Jossed by Season 2, M/M, Post Red Dragon, Prison, he takes it, institutionalization, one-sided Hannibal/Mason, questionable theraputic practice, scarred!will, social experimentation, wrongful accusation, wrongful incarceration
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-31
Updated: 2014-01-03
Packaged: 2017-12-13 14:17:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 29,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/825246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onawingandaswear/pseuds/onawingandaswear
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At the end of it all, Hannibal is still in a cage of stone and glass and steel. There was never a thought that Will Graham might come to occupy the cell adjacent to his own.<br/>_______</p><p>*Complete 1/2/14*</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane; Excerpt from Official Transcript; Supervising Therapist: Dr. Leslie Burnett; Patient: Graham, William; (14:26, 7/28/2017)**

***Recording Start***

_“How do you feel about Doctor Lecter trying to kill you to prevent being caught?”_

_“How do I feel? That’s what you’re going to start with today?”_

_"Given where we ended yesterday, it seems a logical place to start."_

_“So tell me, is ‘Hannibal the Cannibal’ just too kitschy? This is at least the fifth time you’ve used the license prefix ‘Doctor’, which, by now, I am fairly confident has been suspended by the Maryland Board of Medicine.”_

_“We’re not here to discuss grammar, we’re here to discuss your experience and work through your trauma.”_

_“I have a scar that runs from my lower abdomen to my ribcage, where a man who had known me intimately for over a year tried to eviscerate me. I’ve spent far too much time thinking about what he did and why he did it. Why he didn’t kill me sooner, why he dragged it out so long, what the alternative might have been. I think, really, at the end, he was just trying to save me from what came next.”_

_“And what was that?”_

_“This. All of this. The trials, the exposure, the incarceration. I think he thought killing me would save me from facing the consequences of his actions.”_

_“Or he was simply protecting himself.”_

_“I’ve entertained that thought, but no, his ‘actions’ came from a place of desperation. He wanted to protect me from himself. The only way to do that was to kill me.”_

_“As a man who profiled serial killers for a living, do you see the flawed logic you’ve subscribed to?  That a man of [Lecter’s] constitution is even capable of affection?”_

_“You’re a therapist in an asylum. Your job is to stay as emotionally distant from your patients as humanly possible. You can’t even begin to understand what I was asked to do. What I still do at the behest of your supervisor.”_

_“That’s what I’m here to help you work through.”_

_“My job was to get so deep into a murderer’s psyche that I couldn’t tell where I ended and the killer began. So when I said I was intimate with Lecter, I didn’t mean in the physical sense. I let that man into every aspect of my life, and he was the closest thing I’d had to a friend in god knows how long. I can’t tell you if he truly cared for me, but Hannibal Lecter was a good man right up until the moment he wasn’t.”_

_“Surely you’ve entertained the thought that he was never a good man, that it was all a facade?”_

_“I can tell you this, because it was my job to know this: he didn’t try to kill me out of spite, or anger. He had too much respect for me, for our relationship, to do that. ”_

_“I know you believe that, Will.”_

_“I believe a number of things: I believe I’m sane. I believe that I was wrongfully incarcerated. I believe that when I leave this room, you’ll note that I have some sort of repressed physical and emotional attraction to the man that put me in a coma and ultimately landed me in the chair before you. So please, really, tell me what I believe. Tell me what I believe, and I’ll tell you where you can shove your pre-packaged psychoanalytical bullshit.”_

_***** _ **Recording Stopped***

 

* * *

 

Hannibal Lecter kills Will Graham on a Tuesday evening, spilling blood across slick-green Connemara tile with steady hands and the same distant remorse that haunted him specter-like throughout his youth. 

The act is reflexive, the wide curve of the knife cutting up through Will’s abdomen with the deft accuracy Hannibal brought to his medical career; and everything that makes Will Graham human spills to the the ground in a mess of viscera and steaming, wet meat.

Will gasps and struggles like a fish pulled from a bowl by a careless child, and Hannibal doesn’t want the night to end like this. 

He snarls something crude about devouring Will’s heart, but the words are hollow, masking the regret that curls through him like a disease too old and too fierce to be tamed by the sugar-pill platitudes of modern medicine. 

He doesn’t want this. Not really.

What he wants is to pull the red currant-glazed sea bass from the oven, pour two glasses of chardonnay and sit across from Will to savor the meal he has so carefully prepared for them both.

However, plans go awry. Will asks questions Hannibal is not prepared to answer, and he strikes out reflexively like a cornered animal, lunging with deadly claws in lieu of highly evolved intellect.

Will looks up at him with devastated eyes and tries valiantly to speak words that Hannibal does not want to hear, and Hannibal can only press his face to Will’s, breathing in iron and copper and cheap aftershave, to whisper vicious, biting threats interspersed with involuntary apologies and _forgive me, Will, forgive me_.

Hannibal is convinced the deed is done, until a tell-tale crack of gunpowder thunder forces him to his feet even as pain blossoms across his abdomen, shooting up his nerve endings with crippling precision; he looks down, watching as fresh crimson stains the front of his dress shirt. His own blood mingling with Will’s.

“I...forgive you...” Will rasps from the floor, one hand holding in his small intestines, the other leveling a black service pistol at Hannibal, a look of vengeful triumph on his face. 

For a brief, shining moment, the world exists only for the two of them. Blood and anger and regret and Hannibal feels oily affection coiling through him, intertwining with crippling agony. 

Then Will fires again, and again, and again, forcing Hannibal back and down, to fall bodily against his desk, sliding to rest on the now ruined carpet. 

He would laugh if his lungs weren’t filling with fluid.

There are sirens in the distance, and Hannibal realizes that Will must have lied about coming to see him first.

“Doctor...Lecter...” Hannibal hears Will weakly over the rush of blood in his own ears. “We...need to discuss...pro-professional boundaries...”

Hannibal does laugh this time, resting his head against imported ebony and tasting blood. He presses his lavender silk pocket square hard to the most severe of his wounds and feels the fabric grow wet.

“Next week then?” Hannibal breathes thickly, black spotting his vision. He can smell the risotto burning thick and dry on the stovetop and the sirens are deafening, the sound slipping from one sense to the next until he can feel the whining pulse deep in his bones. 

Hannibal will survive his wounds, excessive though they might be. Will, however, Will’s death will not be an easy one. More than anything Hannibal feels regret, but this is better for the both of them. Will can be spared from the coming storm, and Hannibal is spared from Will’s damning empathy. 

Part of him hopes Will won’t be there to accuse him. Part of him hopes Will survives his wounds. Part of him regrets inviting Will over tonight at all.

Hannibal allows the pulsing of the sirens to lull him into unconsciousness, knowing instinctively that he will awaken on the other side of this dream a public enemy. 

 

* * *

 

Hannibal wakes through a morphine haze and doesn’t need to move his arms to know he’s restrained. The steady thrum of heart monitors and respirators and muffled voices throwing him back to the days he spent attempting to save the lives of men and women he’d just as soon have killed. 

He can’t speak around the tracheal apparatus and he can’t free his arms to remove the tube, so he is forced to wait a full twenty-three minutes before a young residency doctor notices his condition during rounds. 

Word must travel quickly, because its not a long wait at all before Jack Crawford appears, expression thunderous and Hannibal can only assume why that might be.

The man orders a nurse with thin blonde hair into the hall to wait with another agent Hannibal can’t identify from where he’s strapped to the hospital bed, and Jack looms over him in what he must think is a threatening position.

“It was _you_.” Jack hisses when the door shuts behind them. “This whole time, you were the Ripper. I let you into my _home_.”

Hannibal doesn’t really see the appeal in keeping up appearances at this point.

“You let me into your home, and I let you into my kitchen. I believe we both know what that means.” Hannibal speaks as steadily as he can, his voice hoarse from disuse and the residual effects of the feeding tube, and Jack looks as if the floor has dropped from beneath his feet.

“Did you really not piece it together until now?” Hannibal questions playfully. “Because I would have expected someone in your position to be slightly more intelligent.”

Hannibal allows himself a moment to savor the warring emotions on Jack’s face when the man throws up a hand, index finger pointing in a manner Jack must feel will intimidate him.

“I’m going to make sure you rot, Lecter.” he says, already moving away. “We’re finished here.” he announces loudly, and Hannibal just laughs, throat burning. Jack rips the door wide, the force slamming it against the wall with a crack.

“Oh, I assure you, Jack, that is far from the truth.” Hannibal calls after him, savoring the implications and the knowledge that finally, _finally_ , he does not have to bow to his lessors. “Don’t you want to know what happened to Miriam?”

Jack reappears in the doorway, expression blank and Hannibal knows he’s won.

“I know what happened. She got too close, and you killed her.” Jack says, clearly intending to have the last word.

“Yes,” Hannibal agrees. “I killed her. I killed her, and you ate her. It is amazing how long you can keep meat these days, don’t you agree?”

Jack’s face twists up and he’s gone again from sight.

Hannibal lets his eyes slip shut, irritated that his body is still too weak to stay alert, but the discomfort passes.

Even now, even in defeat, Hannibal has emerged victorious.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is the first chapter of a much longer fic regarding the capture, trial and incarceration of Hannibal Lecter and how that incarceration might have gone if Chilton had gotten his hands on Will after Hannibal's sentencing. 
> 
> Title comes from the William Blake poem, 'Three Things to Remember', the line is also found in another of his works, 'Auguries of Innocence'.
> 
> As always, feel free to drop me a line on my tumblr if you'd like to chat or stay updated on what I'm working on: onawingandaswear.tumblr.com


	2. Chapter 2

**Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane; Excerpt from Official Transcript; Supervising Therapist: Dr. Frederick Chilton; Patient: Lecter, Hannibal; (9:14, 8/16/2015)**

  ***Recording Start***

  _“You’re famous, Doctor Lecter.”_

_“Though not as famous as I will be when you publish your findings on the results of my behavioral analysis.”_

_“Hopefully.”_

_“‘Hopefully’? Do you mean for the report to reflect positively in regard to my infamy or to potentially erase the public memory of your own past failures regarding would-be serial killers?”_

_“I know you’re trying to get a rise out of me, but I’m here to tell you that it wouldn’t be wise to upset the man who’s going to be in charge of your amenities. I was in your home, Doctor. I know exactly how to make your stay with us dreadfully uncomfortable.”_

_“You are making a great mistake in assuming that I am adverse to hardship, Frederick. If there is one thing in this world I have learned to do, it is survive. Amenities or no, I will outlast you.”_

_“You don’t frighten me. You’re just a broken man clinging to the last shreds of his freedom, and I have seen every horror you can imagine walk through these halls. There is nothing you can say that will shock me.”_

_“I fed you the tongue of your daughter’s english tutor. Does that shock you?”_

***Recording Stop***

* * *

 

“We’re going to lose,” Hannibal’s lawyer tells him when they first meet, before social niceties have been exchanged and before Hannibal can arrange his restraints in a manner that allows him to sit comfortably.

After six months his injuries have largely healed, but his lung capacity is still significantly decreased and his chest burns if he doesn’t find just the right angle to hold himself upright. 

“We are going to lose and you’re going to prison. I’ll do my best, for reputation’s sake, but no jury in the world is going to let you walk.”

Hannibal’s accounts have been frozen, his assets seized, and the only option afforded to him is the court-appointed public defender before him who has little interest in actually keeping him out of a state institution; a jaded woman in her forties who introduces herself as Jennifer Clarke and holds posture like a woman who is not getting enough calcium in her diet.

She looks at Hannibal with such disdain that for a moment he is grateful for the thick plexiglass that separates them.

They discuss witnesses, expert testimony and pleading insanity. 

Hannibal notes that ‘Will Graham’ is not listed on the prosecution’s proposed witness list.

“I would like to at least attempt to defend myself.” Hannibal tells her firmly, and Clarke stares at him with the eyes of a doe too startled to get out of the path of oncoming traffic.

“You’re the new Dahmer,” she says closing the file and obscuring the name Hannibal knows is not actually listed. “They want to see you on a _spit_.” 

She stands abruptly, gathering her papers. “The best we can hope for is an insanity plea, and I know you are a smart enough man to have already acknowledged that fact.”

Hannibal leans forward in his seat, ignoring the biting pain in his chest.

“This is going to happen one of two ways,” he starts, and she deflates, her dismissive nature gone as readily as it had been introduced. “Either you get yourself together and do your job properly, defending me to the best of your ability and I am placed in a maximum security penitentiary as a member of the general population, or you defend me to the best of your ability and I am placed in a maximum security mental institution.”

“Which on do you want?” she asks him, tone wry and uninterested.

“No, my dear,” Hannibal counters. “The question is which one will prevent your eventual death.”

Clarke smiles tightly.

“I’ll see you thursday, Mister Lecter.”

“It’s ‘Doctor’.” Hannibal says as she walks away and the guards come to fix his restraints.

Hannibal knows he is condemned to his fate before his trial ever occurs. 

The Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane holds him for months, as he is too high a flight risk to be granted bail. He makes himself comfortable, because unless Clarke suddenly finds the motivation to put her due diligence toward obtaining his freedom, this will be Hannibal’s new place of residence.

 

* * *

 

Hannibal spends weeks being shuttled between his cell, therapy sessions and appointments with his lawyer. The food is bland and drugged, his clothing is made of synthetic material and he has no privacy between the curious staff and oblivious patients.

Perhaps this is why it is so surprising to see a familiar face, albeit an unwanted one.

“You know your lawyer cut a book deal? Trial doesn’t even have a date yet and she’s already cashing in. Doesn’t it make you furious? Almost like you could just kill someone?”

“You really must work on your projection issues, Ms. Lounds.” Hannibal tells her, refusing to move from the cot that now constitutes his bed. 

A part of Hannibal longs for his Egyptian cotton linens, but that same part is mocked by the memory of a young man shivering beneath surplus Soviet wool blankets.

“And I must say it is quite surprising to see you.”

“I have my connections, and please, call me Freddie.”

“I am sure you do, _Freddie_.” Hannibal can already feel his patience waning.

“You know the press thinks Will Graham was working with you?” Lounds offers calmly, her disinterested tone intended to be baiting. 

Hannibal is not pleased that this information catches him by surprise. His ignorance must show on his face, because Lounds smiles indulgently and pushes a curl of shockingly red hair away from her face; a motion conveying arrogant superiority.

“I see this is news to you. You should hear the speculation, you gut him like a pig, and everyone thinks it’s because you two had some sort of falling out; maybe a lover’s quarrel?” 

“And I am sure you had nothing to do with that sort of speculation.” Hannibal says, and Lounds smiles, pink lips pulled taught across her teeth.

“Well, a candlelight dinner for two and an almost double murder? You don’t have to be a detective to figure that one out.”

“No. Just a tabloid journalist, it would seem.”

“I’m only here to verify my sources, get my information right from the horse’s mouth.”

Hannibal grimaces at the expression. 

“Does it excite you, tiptoeing through the world of men; seducing as you please to attain what you desire?”

Lounds looks smug as she leans back in her chair, posture purposefully accentuating her pale neck and cleavage.

“I’m not afraid of you, Lecter. I don’t have to worry about a thing, not anymore because you’re in there and I’m out here, and we both know I have the power to say whatever I want. The second I get caught, in here, talking to you, my legitimacy increases tenfold. If you want your story told, I’m the one to do it.”

“I seem to recall you making a similar pitch to Abigail Hobbs, and besides, it seems you already have your story: ‘Intrepid reporter risks life to interview Ripper’. What ever could you possibly need from me?”

“The Shrike is old news, and I already told you. I need verification. Legitimacy. I have a source at the FBI who swears up and down that you and Graham were ‘intimate’,” Hannibal runs the information through his mind, wondering who was close enough to Will to wrongfully assume such a thing, but loses the thought when Lounds presses on. “I want to know if that’s true. Were you sleeping together? Was he helping you with the murders?”

The questions rattle through Hannibal’s skull like pebbles thrown at a window pane, and misplaced regret coils hot in the back of his mind.

“I am the Chesapeake Ripper, I received no assistance,” he tells her, and as much as Hannibal wishes things had ended differently, that is the truth.

Lounds appears displeased by the answer and something akin to a sneer works its way across her mouth.

“Are you sure? Because it sounds like you’re covering for Graham.”

Hannibal is angry at himself for not anticipating this course of conversation.

“It sounds like you have the story you wish to write already well documented, _Freddie._ ”

Lounds purses her lips and scowls.

“You’re really going to stand there and tell me you have nothing to say. You’re going to give me free reign to write whatever I want without objection?”

“I have objected. I have told you the truth. Your arrogance and ignorance have glossed any legitimacy you are likely to find here today, and quite frankly I am surprised you have made it this far as a journalist given your complete lack of interest in uncovering worthwhile information. Consider, if you will, your drive to break into a high security facility to interview an accused serial murderer. I would think that any journalist worth her salt would at least prepare some questions first, or was your largest concern finding a guard dumb enough to trade your cunt for an access code?”

Lounds goes red in the face. 

“I haven’t forgotten your little threats, _Hannibal._ I’m going to do everything in my power to make sure you and that psycho Graham waste away behind prison bars.”

The first ‘your’ is clearly plural, and Lounds speaks of Will in the present tense. 

Hannibal’s breathing stutters before he can recover himself. Up until this moment there has been no legitimate indication from anyone that Will had survived his ordeal.

“Oh, my God,” Lounds laughs, hand held teasingly over he lips in a parody of surprise. “Did no one tell you? After all this time?”

Hannibal takes a step toward the bars and Lounds takes a single step back grinning like she’s accomplished some great feat.

“You didn’t quite hit the mark on that one, Doctor.”

He tries to think of something to say, anything to quell his screaming mind, but nothing comes so he lets out a breath through his teeth; a low _hiss_ that fills the room.

“I’ll see you in court, Doctor.” Lounds smiles and turns away, hair bobbing as she walks away, radiating joy and victory.  

Hannibal can’t say the same about how he feels at the moment, however.

 

* * *

 

Long after Freddie Lounds’ visit, after Hannibal has had ample time to compose himself, asks a night guard after the well being of his former patient.

“The last guy you tried to kill, right? Graham? He’s alive, barely,” the balding man tells him. James, the name-tag on his left pectoral supplies. “In a coma or some shit. News says he can’t testify anyway, ‘cause he’s a suspect too.”

“Pardon?”

“Yeah, something about finding human DNA in his fridge. The papers are saying it’s suspected that he’s your partner, that the FBI may have freelanced two psychopaths.”

The information leaves a sour taste in Hannibal’s mouth, but really everything accomplishes that feat these days.

“They will lock him away to punish me.”

It’s not a question, and James gives him an odd look. “What, so he didn’t help you?” 

“If he did, he was an unwilling participant.”

“But you two were fucking, right?”

Something twists in Hannibal at the implication.

“Our compatibility had nothing to do with my actions.”

“So you just gutted your boyfriend? For no reason at all?”

Hannibal doesn’t bother to scour away the look of distaste that he knows is creeping across his features or correct the man’s misinformed assumption.

“I did not want to see him hurt by my actions.” Hannibal tells him.

The man looks almost sympathetic, but then seems to realize who he’s conversing with and must think better of it, schooling the expression from his face.

“Pretty fucked up way of expressing your affection,” he says, moving away from Hannibal’s cell.

“I am aware of this all too well.” Hannibal agrees.

The conversation ends as abruptly as it had begun, but Hannibal has his answers. Will is alive, if just barely enough to complicate things terribly.

* * *

 

A trial date is set, a jury selected, and Clarke appears unexpectedly one morning wearing day-old clothes and and reeking of exhaustion.

“The prosecution is claiming you’re violent, unstable, and certain precautions need to be taken while you’re in the court room.”

“And what, exactly, do those procedures entail?” Hannibal asks her, genuinely curious.

“It’s completely archaic,” she starts, but is reluctant to continue.

“Ms. Clarke?” Hannibal prods lightly.

“It’s a muzzle. They want to play up the cannibal angle. You also won’t be allowed to appear in your own clothing. You have to wear what the hospital provides.”

Hannibal could care less about the mask, but appearing in public without decent attire is enough to make him gag.

“Tell them I’m amenable to the facial restraints if I can wear a suit.” Hannibal offers, and returns to his reading. 

Clarke looks vaguely nauseous but nods and moves to leave.

“Ms. Clarke?” Hannibal stops her. “If you have any control over such decisions, the navy Valentino three-piece. Matte black Zegna loafers, cornflower blue silk tie, matching pocket square.”

She nods again and departs.

“If they are worried I am a danger to society,” Hannibal tells himself, thumbing through the list of his federal charges. “Then I shall make myself one.”

 

* * *

 

Hannibal takes a page out of Abel Gideon’s playbook and fakes an illness.

By the time everything is said and done, there’s a orderly in the infirmary who is going to lose his left hand and a guard that is going to need plastic surgery to repair what has been done to his face.

They don’t let him wear his suit.

 

* * *

 

Hannibal’s trial takes weeks, a long, drawn out thing that seems to serve no purpose but to gratuitously examine every facet of Hannibal’s crimes, and he’s terribly bored by the third day. The blubbering family members and the hard-lipped jury members, the prosecuting lawyers practically vibrating with the knowledge that this will be the case that makes their career, it’s all so meaningless. 

They tell him to look sympathetic and show remorse, but there is really no point given the menacing nature of the apparatus strapped to his face.

After the first two weeks, Clarke begins spiking her morning coffee. She recycles the same phrases in interviews, and she tells him they’re pleading insanity. He’s not insane, and the implication is offensive, but she puts forth the filing anyway. 

Truthfully, Hannibal quite prefers Chilton as the devil he knows.

It’s nauseating waiting for the pathetic masses to determine his fate, so he stops trying. He takes off his ‘human veil’, as Bedelia had once so eloquently put it, and takes the stand.

He baits the prosecution, watches as the countless reporters lining the back wall tweet and blog and post about his insanity. His god complex. His chilling demeanor as viewed through the rose-colored lens of a distinctly American xenophobia.

They co-opt Freddie Lounds’ genius word association and dub him ‘Hannibal the Cannibal’.

They’re not wrong, even if the descriptor is vulgar.

Jack Crawford is called in by the prosecution, and the man rakes Hannibal over the coals, his rage so tangible Hannibal can almost taste it.

When they call Abigail, Hannibal is curious to see what will occur. When they question her about Hannibal’s role in her life, if he threatened her or harmed her in any way, Abigail looks to Hannibal with pleading eyes. Hannibal dips his head slightly, as much as is possible given the restraints, to give her permission to take the opportunity afforded her.

She tells the court about how Hannibal murdered Nicholas Boyle and threatened her to prevent her from informing the FBI. There are tears and she looks horrified by the end of he story, but Hannibal gives her what he hopes is a forgiving smile before she’s spirited away.

Hannibal knows he’ll never see her again.

 

* * *

 

The ‘victims’ of Hannibal’s crimes have requested a chance to confront him before the verdict is read, and he knows exactly what these people want to see. They want to bear witness to a broken man, guilt-ridden by his actions and apologetic; eager to prostrate himself to the will of the public and the court system. They expect him to repent. 

He will do no such thing.

An attractive woman in her early forties stands, makeup smudged and whimpering pathetically, and begins to speak about her late husband; one of Hannibal’s most recent harvests and waste of sentient flesh. The room is aghast when he tells her as much, and also reveals the existence of the man’s second family.

A pattern soon emerges, and Hannibal gets some small pleasure from watching the faces of the mourning family members grow horrified as he recounts the events that forced his hand to begin with.

Hannibal knows there are more families, but after a time no one else steps forward. Collectively unwilling, it would seem, to wish to discover that their spouse had been unfaithful, that their child had been a pedophile or that their parent had simply cursed their way into an entree.

The whole world is against him now, and cheers erupt when the foreman declares Hannibal guilty of all charges. The verdict should sting more than it does.

Really, though, he’s just glad Will isn’t conscious to witness Hannibal's fall from grace.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “The way you attacked him, the damage you did, motive or no, indicates a deep-seated, self-directed and internalized rage at the committing of the crime in general. You wanted to punish yourself, and the easiest way to do that, the most painful way, was to harm Will.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, just to clarify, in the book 'Hannibal Rising', Hannibal does canonically use the term and memory technique of the 'mental palace'.

**Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane; Excerpt from Official Transcript; Supervising Therapist: Dr. Frederick Chilton; Patient: Lecter, Hannibal; (13:11, 6/24/2014)**

**//Audio Recording Edited for Content (Federal Authorization: 70392-Crawford, Jack; 6/12/2018)//**

***Recording Start***

  

_“-and the only reason you’re even here is because I testified that you were more valuable alive.”_

_“Losing control of your temper in front of your staff and patients? Not the most efficient way to run an asylum, one might think the stress is getting to you. Perhaps I’ll write an article on your deteriorating mental state. I’m sure I can find a journal to publish it, after all my name carries such weight in our field-”_

_“I’ve worked too long and too hard on this, I will find a way to make you give me what I want.”_

_“Is that supposed to frighten me?”_

 

***Recording End***

 

* * *

 

 **Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane; Excerpt from Official Transcript; Supervising Therapist: Dr. Leslie Burnett; Patient: Graham, William; (8:19, 10/19/2017)**

**//Audio Recording Edited for Content (Federal Authorization: 70392-Crawford, Jack; 6/12/2018)//**

***Recording Start***

 

_“This is all a game. An epic, cataclysmic battle between a god and a man, and I’m just a pawn. The priest that can translate the text but can't write it. ”_

_“Why would you believe that?”_

_“In what reality is it an approved therapeutic practice to place a patient in direct contact with their would-be murderer?”_

_“Are you referring to the fact that Doctor Lecter is housed in the same facility as yourself?”_

_“No, I mean I have been living in a cell next to Hannibal Lecter.”_

_“That can’t be right,”_

_“I assure you, it is.”_

_*shuffling*_

_“But you’re in a minimum security wing, it’s in your file,”_

_“Tell that to the cannibal that talks me to sleep every night.”_

  

***Recording End***

 

* * *

 

Hannibal has studied the effects of social exclusion. In some circles, he’s still a respected authority on the subject.

Perhaps this is why it is so difficult to watch his carefully crafted reality slip away, the beauty of a world Hannibal has spent so long creating devolving into a brick and mortar institution of unintelligible minds and cloying, pheromone-thick fear.

Rage claws at his innards like a disease borne of the flesh, and he feeds that imagined bacterium fire with knowledge of the world he’d left behind.

His sanity is never in question, for his mind will never really be his to lose. His patience, however; his finely tuned restraint, those things deteriorate with all the finesse of a crumbling dam. Playing these games, jumping through hoops like a well trained animal, truthfully he’s torn. 

There is the distinct pleasure of watching a man like Frederick Chilton choke on the fumes of his failure, but that failure is inexorably tied to Hannibal’s public persona. Does he continue to publish, humiliating his jailer at the cost of offering the medical community an unobstructed glimpse of his psyche, or does he drop the veil and expose a man he’s not even sure exists?

Hannibal lets his head fall back against the wall and allows the metal edge of the bunk press sharply into his calf. His muscle tone is deteriorating without sufficient protein intake. Too many carbohydrates. Vegetable slop that lacks sufficient vitamin content.

He can’t stop the way his lip pinches up into what feels like a sneer.

He has to stop thinking about food. About freedom. There will come a time and place for such thoughts, but now is not that moment.

Hannibal relaxes his face, muscles loosening as he allows his eyes to slip shut. It has been far too long since he last meditated, and seeing as his schedule for the next hundred and twenty years has been left unoccupied, he might as well begin the practice again. 

He’d missed his mental palace.  Perhaps now would be a fitting time for a series of renovations.

 

* * *

 

“Years. I’ve known you for years. And all this time?“

“All this time.” Hannibal agrees. “I feel like there is nothing I can say to placate you?”

“You’re damn right about that.” Alana Bloom pulls a folding chair from where it seems to be perpetually backed against the wall outside of his cell; placed, evidently, for the comfort of the endless stream of mental health professionals attempting to successfully profile him.

Her hair is shorter now, barely skimming the soft ridges of her clavicle bones.

“Should I assume you have worked past your revulsion toward me?” he asks her, as cordially as he can muster in a dull-blue jumpsuit.

“Oh, no, when you were caught I purged until there was very little liquid left in my body,” she laughs without humor and twists at a silver ring on her right index finger. 

“Every now and then I see an article about you, or your victims, and I get nauseous thinking, ‘What part of that man did I consume?’, ‘Did I ingest that woman’s flesh?”. So, no, I haven’t yet worked through my revulsion toward you or your crimes. That fact does not, however, make me any less curious about why you did what you did.”

A small part of Hannibal, an infinitesimal part, really, wants to comfort Alana. Wrap her in a blanket and brush away the doubt that plagues her mind.

He had feelings for her once, and Hannibal remembers the spark of arousal that would burn through him whenever she wore that one burgundy blouse; always with a dark pencil skirt and two-inch pumps so as not to strain her arches. There was a time when he imagined what that outfit would look like strewn haphazardly around his office, her legs around his waist, heels digging into the meat of his thighs. That was some time ago, however, and he respects the woman before him now too much to defile her in such a way.

Nonetheless, he smiles at the memory as Alana barrels on.

“Hannibal, what happened? Really? A hundred and one studies pop up theorizing why you’re you, and I’ve read them all, Hannibal, I have; but at the end of the day I knew you, I was your friend, and I had no idea. I still have no idea.”

“You should not blame yourself, I have spent a great deal of my life hiding my proclivities.” he tells her honestly, leaning slightly against the bars of his cell.

“I hope you have some idea what you’ve put me through, not that you care,” she bites back, but trails off, for the first time seeing the drawings Hannibal has only haphazardly been able to place around his cell, her eyes catching on a sketch Hannibal has not found the energy to complete.

“Is that Abigail?” Hannibal maintains his position and waits for Alana to return her attention to him. “Why do you have a picture of her?”

“I am not allowed any of my personal possessions, it became necessary to recreate what I could.”

The brief flash of pity that Alana displays annoys Hannibal more than anything else, even if there is a burn that accompanies the expression. 

It’s misplaced and infuriating.

“Where am I?” Alana asks suddenly, gaze fierce, and Hannibal recognizes the challenging tone. “Where’s Will?”

“I knew you would come to see me at some point, it was not as vital an effort to capture your image on paper.”

“Well that’s a fuck you if I’ve ever heard one,” she mutters, her stage whisper tenor carrying easily through the hallway. “But you expect to see Will again as well?”

“Why are you here really, Alana? It is not for an explanation, not really, and it’s not for information,” she makes a face at his remarks and he knows exactly what this is all regarding. “You’re here to chastise me.” 

Alana narrows her eyes and stands abruptly, unable to prevent the chair from skidding back a enough to make a hollow sound.

“What you did was unforgivable, and I have no doubt that something in your childhood broke you so badly there was nothing left to fix, but dragging Will into this?  You wanted him to suffer.”

The accusation falls flat and the room echoes with silence as Hannibal formulates a response worthy of the woman that stands before him. Once a friend, a colleague; on more than one occasion an almost lover.

“I did not intend Will to survive,” he starts, voice unrepentant.

“Obviously.” Alana spits with all the venom Hannibal is sure she thinks he deserves.

“I did not intend him to discover my nature, I did not intend him to survive. Despite what you may think of me, my actions were meant to be merciful.”

“Bullshit. If you wanted to be merciful, to protect him, you would have slit his throat; pierced his heart. A thousand deaths you could have delivered that would have been quick and relatively painless, but you gutted him. You wanted to hurt him. There is a legitimate reason that so many people think you had feelings for Will, and it all stems from the way you tried to end his life.”

“No,” Hannibal corrects firmly. “The rumors of a relationship stemmed from Freddie Lounds whoring herself out for unverified information.”

“Information that has been backed up by behavioral scientists.” Alana counters, arms crossed over her chest.

“Alana, you believe we were friends, and I seem to maintain the same delusion, so tell me, honestly, what do you think transpired between myself and Will Graham?”

“I think you manipulated him. You exploited his ability to empathize with psychotic individuals to place yourself in a position of power and to avoid detection as the Chesapeake Ripper.”

Hannibal ducks his head in an understanding nod. Hers is a fair assessment.

“I also think,” Alana continues, undeterred. “That you felt a connection to Will, which, given more time, may have developed into something tangible.”

Hannibal drops his head and groans loudly to play up the dramatics of the moment.

“Not you as well, Alana,” he bemoans. “After everything,”

“The way you attacked him, the damage you did, motive or no, indicates a deep-seated, self-directed and internalized rage at the committing of the crime in general. You wanted to punish yourself, and the easiest way to do that, the most painful, was to harm Will.”

Alana adjusts her skirt, the unconscious motion signaling their conversation has come to a close.

“Go ahead,” she says tightly. “Ask. I know you want to.”

Hannibal pushes himself away from the bars and watches Alana. Her calf muscle twitching slightly from where she’s trying not to bounce her heel and show her nervousness.

“How is he.” Hannibal offers finally, and she blinks hard.

“He’s mostly healed. He’s being brought up on a number of otherwise unsubstantiated charges because of your relationship,” she places a hard emphasis on ‘relationship’. “Jack is fighting tooth and nail to get him off the hook, but after Gideon,” she doesn't finish the though, and rightfully so. Gideon had nearly cost Jack his career, let alone Will's legitimacy in the field.

“Guilty until proven innocent.” Hannibal tells her, the colloquialism bitter on his tongue, and she hums in agreement.

“No trial date yet, but they’ll rake him through the coals for the sake of a story. Somedays I wish you had killed him. Saved us all the trouble of watching him die slowly.”

Alana purposefully nudges the chair backward with the tip of her shoe, the sharp ring of metal on concrete reverberating through the hallway.

“I’ll be seeing you, Hannibal.” Alana tells him, tone indicating that seeing him again may be the last thing she will ever voluntarily do, so Hannibal waves a hand in dismissal.

She’s almost out of sight when Hannibal whistles sharply and the click of her shoes halts.

“One last thing, Alana,” he calls out to her. “You wondered what you’d consumed?” 

The silence of reluctant curiosity is the only response he receives.

“I do care about you, as a dear friend and colleague. Perhaps that is why I spent so long curing the wine barrel.”

Hannibal will go to sleep that night recalling the sound of Dr. Alana Bloom regurgitating her lunch atop Frederick Chilton’s Italian leather loafers.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, feel free to drop me a line on my tumblr if you'd like to chat or stay updated on what I'm working on: onawingandaswear.tumblr.com


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "You asked me to forgive you. More than once. At first I thought about Abigail and how her father kept apologizing, telling her it would be alright, and I realized that wasn't it. Hobbs killed those girls to prevent himself from killing his daughter. You,"
> 
> Will stops again, but Hannibal genuinely wants to hear what the man has to say.
> 
> "You didn't want to kill me. Not really."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This extra long chapter is for Amanda (sfumatosoup), Happy Birthday, Lady!

**Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane; Excerpt from Official Transcript; Supervising Therapist: Dr. Frederick Chilton; Patient: Lecter, Hannibal; (9:14, 7/16/2017)**

**//Audio Recording Edited for Content (Federal Authorization: 70392-Crawford, Jack; 6/12/2018)//**

***Recording Start***

 

_“So, tell me, how are you liking your accommodations? Everything up to your standards?”_

_“What did you have to do to get him here? Auction off your mythical PhD? Prostrate yourself before a federal court?”_

_“Taunt me all you like, but this is me victorious.”_

_“Victorious. You are a child; unable to earn respect so you demand it. You have no idea what you want to come of this. Not really. If you did, you never would have brought him here; you would not have put him in that kind of danger. Tell me, are you prepared to lose everything once I’ve destroyed him? Do you believe your reputation still has enough resilience to withstand the onslaught of a federal inquiry? ”_

_“Are you going to attempt to harm Will Graham?”_

_“I already have, Frederick.”_

_“Hannibal, Will Graham has given his informed consent with the full-faith backing of a federal investigative agency. I can pursue any treatment I deem necessary, and I’ll tell you, he is in desperate need of legitimate psychological therapy. He’s absolutely convinced that he’s being housed in a cell next to a mentally deranged cannibal, the same man that tried to kill him a few years back. So, it is quite easy to see that his mental condition is rapidly deteriorating, and I’m going to do everything I can to make sure he’s healthy and hale by the time he’s ready to be released.”_

_“Am I to assume that this was your grand plan?”_

_“I simply want to understand Will Graham’s ‘empathy disorder’, as you so quaintly described it to me all those years ago. Right now, you’re just the catalyst. That’s all you’ll be unless you start playing along, because I have six months with him, but I have a lifetime with you.”_

***Recording Stop***

* * *

 

**Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane; Excerpt from Official Transcript; Supervising Therapist: Dr. Frederick Chilton; Patient: Graham, William; (14:26, 8/24/2017)**

**//Audio Recording Edited for Content (Federal Authorization: 70392-Crawford, Jack; 6/12/2018)//**  

***Recording Start***

 

_“I understand you’re having some concerns about your sleeping arrangements.”_

_“That’s one way to put it.”_

_“Well, I don’t see a problem here. Second floor, western facing window; I understand you have a nice view of the duck pond.”_

_“You and I both know that’s a lie.”_

_“Mister Graham, we’ve had our differences in the past, but trust me, I have your best interests at heart. You did consent to be treated.”_

_“I did consent, but not to be treated by you. Not in this facility, I don’t know how you managed to get me transferred-”_

_“You have another three months here, Mister Graham. Hopefully we’ll have you sorted out by then.”_

 

***Recording Stop***

 

* * *

 

There’s too much time. Time to think. To assess. To regret.

Alana doesn’t return after her initial visit, and the lack of new information only allows Hannibal to turn their last conversation over in his mind until the words and realizations have evolved; their meanings simultaneously revelatory and illusory.

It is not until months after the fact that Hannibal comes to a realization as he catches himself idly sketching what he can recall of Will Graham in the monochrome of cheap paper and graphite.

Before, Hannibal had seen Will as a kindred soul, and had been drawn to the younger man like a moth to a flame. It was not just Will’s startling empathy, it was his brilliance, his perception and understanding. A myriad of internal and societal pressures that had created a being capable of staring into the abyss and not be lost to it; despite Hannibal’s best misguided efforts at pushing Will over that finite edge.  

Even now, Will holds a place of honor in Hannibal’s memory; a shrine of blood and bone locked away deep in his mental palace, in some ways hidden even from Hannibal’s prying eyes.

If he still had the capacity to dream of pleasant things, he imagines he would dream of Will, hand in hand beside him at the opera. Will playfully helping Hannibal prepare dinner in the kitchen. Will lying naked in Hannibal’s bed. Will with a knife in his hand. 

Will, handsome in such an understated way and so deeply tainted, able to empathize with the most perverse of humanity, lying in Hannibal’s arms, watching him with sympathetic eyes, voicing words of comfort and understanding.  

But Hannibal does not dream of these things. He dreams of copper bathing tubs and the taste of blood. It’s been many years since he last woke to the sounds of his own screams, but the muscle memory remains.

When Hannibal imagines such things, truly allows himself the pleasure of an altered reality, he only feels the hunger that accompanies crippling loneliness. A craving for human contact, an emotional connection, a desire for mutual affection that he has spent far too long attempting to deny.

How. How in the name of all the horrors done to him and done by him did he not realize that what he felt for Will Graham extended beyond platitudinal affection?

His existence does not lack purpose or companionship, it lacks Will.

 

* * *

 

Two years. Two years Hannibal has spent in a featureless room; fed a nutrient-free diet that is prematurely greying his hair and putting him at risk for any number of immune deficiencies. 

Two years Chilton digs at Hannibal, trying to salvage his reputation. Countless tests and analysis, over and over and one day he simply stops responding to questioning. He refuses to fill out the forms. 

Hannibal still writes his articles, he still receives copies of the newest psychological and medical journals, despite the hospital staff’s vehement protests, and he still communicates with the outside world; albeit in a greatly inhibited fashion.

‘Fans’ of his work send countless letters and clippings from news outlets worldwide. The process of sifting through the drivel is exhausting, letter after banal letter confessing appreciation for his work while the mentally confused and the emotionally stunted confess love and adoration, ignorant of the knowledge that their blind worship is as meaningless to him now as the color of the sky, but he does glean important information from these sources. 

This is how he discovers the details of Will’s delightfully disturbing lawsuit.

Hannibal does feel a slight twinge of guilt over the whole thing, seeing as the case was brought not by the state but by the surviving families of Hannibal’s victims; alleging that Will’s interaction with Hannibal constituted gross negligence at best and accessory to murder at worst. 

If Hannibal’s legal misadventures were trying, he cannot fathom the unending torture Will’s arraignment must have been. Especially for a man of Will’s unique emotional vulnerability, but the trial comes and goes. Will is found not guilty, rightly so, Hannibal believes, and the days slip onward.

At least until Jenna Burkhardt of Birmingham, Alabama - a mother of two with an unfaithful husband and a taste for the adventurous - writes him about ‘The Book’.

 

* * *

 

‘The Book’ itself is a two-hundred and seventy-four page brick that catalogues the Chesapeake Ripper’s killing spree and subsequent capture compiled and written, unsurprisingly, by one Freddie Lounds of TattleCrime.com fame.

Hannibal never does manage to get his hands on a copy, thanks to the latest squabble between himself and Frederick Chilton, but he is able to glean a substantial amount of information regarding the book’s contents from his adoring public.

Allegedly written and published before the final verdict was handed down at Will’s trial, the ‘tell-all’ accuses Graham of mental instability, obstruction of justice and, perhaps the most damning of all, of being sexually involved with the Chesapeake Ripper. 

Hannibal is informed there are ‘pictures’. Of what, he cannot fathom, but it is easy to see that this tabloid libel has spread far and wide. The number of correspondences he receives daily skyrockets, and suddenly he’s not being damned to the fires of hell for his acts of murder and consumption, but for the significantly more sinister crime of lying with another man. 

The whole event is infuriatingly dull, and while Hannibal is in the perfect position to not be affected in the least, there is no way this storm has not touched Will, and Hannibal is angry for a man he has not seen in years.

A British news outlet offers him thirty-thousand dollars to publish the details of his and Will’s ‘nightmare romance’. Other offers soon follow. He doesn’t respond and the flood of mail crescendos into nothing. 

No amount of petty cash is worth the sacrifice of one’s principles.

Besides, the money would serve Will more readily than it would Hannibal, should the man chose to pursue such avenues; but it's all such vulgar recompense.

 

* * *

 

The deadlock on the security gate doesn’t seal properly if the grate isn’t lined up perfectly; Hannibal notes this as he’s led to the recreation room.

He stores the knowledge away for later.

 

* * *

 

Hannibal’s cell is the farthest removed from the entrance, of the four, he has the added joy of not being able to see much beyond the almost elegant masonry of the opposing wall.

He may spend the rest of his days here, and the one thing that he will never adjust to is the lack of visibility.

“It is a beautiful day outside, Hannibal.” Chilton preens, safely behind the metal that separates Hannibal from the rest of the population. He holds himself stiffly, shoulders braced back and posture military straight; a holdover from the physical therapy Abel Gideon, and Hannibal himself, by proxy, made necessary. 

“The sun is shining, the birds are chirping and you’re in here with me.”

Hannibal doesn’t care, and he doesn’t bother to hide this fact from Chilton, who himself side-eyes Hannibal with muted disdain. Their relationship is not a complicated one, although Chilton’s insistence at calling Hannibal by his first name to establish a false sense of camaraderie and influence is beyond grating.

“Oh, I’d pay attention if I were you, Lecter,” Chilton says, dropping the cadence of his tone so only Hannibal can hear. “Because I’m going to conduct a little experiment. Just between you and me.”

Hannibal lifts a brow and Chilton retreats with an indulgent little grin. 

“Three days, Hannibal.” Chilton calls out, raising his arm to display three slim fingers as he walks away. “Three days, and I get to watch your little world come undone.”

 

* * *

  

Three days come and pass. Hannibal doesn’t expect anything from Chilton, not anymore. There is nothing the man can do that Hannibal can not turn right back around on him.

The droning buzz that preludes the unlocking of the security door is far from alarming, but it is curious. Hannibal looks up from the most recent copy of the American Journal of Psychiatry that he’s managed to procure. 

The inset wall clock silently glows _2:47._ Too early for dinner service and the wrong weekday for recreation. No scheduled therapy or testing. Which means someone is being transferred.

Hannibal desperately hopes they take Miggs. Preferably out back to be shot.

His hopes are shattered when the aforementioned Miggs mutters something vulgar about ‘fresh meat’.

A visitor then.

Hannibal picks up on the carefully measures footfalls of one Frederick Chilton and at least two other men. They stop short of Hannibal’s cell and he can’t see who, or what, exactly, lies beyond.

“This is familiar, isn’t it Mr. Graham? Make nice with your neighbors, and individual therapy starts tomorrow morning.”

Hannibal was not convinced he would ever have another opportunity to feel anticipation in the manner he does now.

"Will?"

“No. No, you’re not here, not now.”

Hannibal cannot prevent the smile that stretches his lips, the muscles protesting the foreign motion.

“Breathe, good Will. It’s two fifty-nine p.m., you are in Catonsville, Maryland, and your name is Will Graham.”

It’s the wrong thing to say. Hannibal knows it’s the wrong thing to say but he has to be sure.

Silence. Blissfully, devastating silence. 

And then, "You've got to be kidding."

Hannibal could laugh, deep and true, in this moment. He pushes up from the table and breathes deeply before calling out to his new neighbor.

“I would have assumed that you have had ample time to work through your psychological issues.”

“Well my brain is no longer a pressure-cooker, if that’s what you mean, but,” Will makes a guttural sound, part nervous cough, part self-deprecating laugh. “I am right beside you, so I don’t know how successful I actually was.” 

 

* * *

 

Hannibal can’t move his cot, or any of his furnishings, for that matter, but he finds that if he sits with his back to the bars, head tilted just so, he can hear Will breathing. Hear him pacing around his cell, eating his dinner, using the bathroom. He spends several days and nights cataloging the auditory actions of Will Graham, learning the most intimate details he can from nothing but sound vibration.

The exercise is not futile one.

What is the most surprising element, at least to Hannibal, is the lack of discomfort in Will’s sleep cycle. There are no impromptu sleepwalking sessions around the cell, no muttering or thrashing in the throws of a particularly active REM cycle. 

Will Graham sleeps unburdened for perhaps the first time since Hannibal has become acquainted with him. It’s a curious, wonderful, anomaly.

Hannibal entertains a brief mental image of himself and Will in bed together, a featureless act in a featureless room, but it's gone as quickly as it comes, replaced by the all-too vivid images of Will bleeding out on his Persian area rug.

 

* * *

 

"This is Chilton's big plan then. Put us together and see what atrocities occur."

"I would not say atrocity, thought I must confess, I am mildly surprised that you are speaking to me at all, given our history."

"Oh, fuck you, Lecter."

"I do not believe I have ever heard you curse before."

Hannibal hears a breathy, humorless laugh, and the sound echoes through him like a grand chorus. It's been so long since he's heard anything beautiful.

"I assume there's a great deal you've never heard me say."

"Speak all the vulgarities you please, Dear Will, there will be no protest from me."

"Well, I'm so grateful I have your permission, you sycophantic, fucking-"

"However, I thought you had found the time to work through your anger?"

“Well, maybe I have a substantially larger amount of rage than previously realized.”

Hannibal smiles, against his better judgement, and raps his knuckles on the six inches of concrete that separates them.

“If you are agreeable, might I ask why you have come to be here at all? It was my understanding you had been cleared of your charges.”

He knows it is a stretch to expect a candid conversation at this point in their relationship, and Hannibal takes Will’s conflicted silence in stride.

“It wasn’t my choice.”

Hannibal catches finally, after almost two hours of silence. Will’s voice is soft and apologetic, though whom he is apologizing to remains a mystery.

“It was a condition of my continued employment with a federal agency.”

“Jack’s doing?” Hannibal asks, but tuts at his own question. “No, he’d try to protect you from this. Someone higher up the chain, high enough to realize you are an asset, but not so high as to order that you be terminated from the Agency. How many lawsuits were brought against the Bureau after your charges were filed?”

“Enough.” Will says bitterly. 

“I am sorry you had to go through all that.” Hannibal offers. “I would have rather spared you that discomfort.”

“You would have had you pulled the knife two inches higher.”

“So I’ve been told.”

“I don’t think you really wanted to kill me.”

“I have also been informed of that as well. Alana claimed it was because I felt a latent attraction toward you.”

“Well, now, I’ve been told about _that_ theory more times than I can count.”

“People seem to possess an avid fascination with the prospect of sexual deviancy in relation to mental instability.”

“You’re not insane. You knew exactly what you were doing.”

“And you think they care? I was muzzled and chained like a animal before the eyes of millions; no individual in their right mind wants to consider the prospect that ‘Hannibal the Cannibal‘ might be sane enough to rationalize his crimes.”

Hannibal pushes himself from the edge of the cot and walks to the desk, shuffling through the loose paper to find his singular portrait of Will. 

He needs to hold something tangible, in lieu of the real thing so desperately separated from him.

“If you want to know the true state of humanity,” Hannibal continues. “Look at what suffering you were forced to endure in the name of justice and accountability. The only surviving victim of the 'Chesapeake Ripper', and instead of sympathy and understanding the public foisted their collective rage and resentment onto your shoulders; blaming you for not discovering me quickly enough, blaming you for not succumbing to the wounds I inflicted upon your being. They blamed you for my crimes because you found the strength to survive.”

Hannibal is met with silence that rings in his ears, and he can feel his heartbeat in his throat; steady, but noticeable.

“You sound angry for me.” Will tells him finally, voice raw and hollow like he had been the one speaking, not Hannibal.

“I am angry for what has become of you.” Hannibal answers, watching the smudged black gaze of Will’s charcoal counterpart.

He doesn’t know how much time passes after he speaks, because he’s lost in the imperfections of his work. Will’s lips are too thin. His cheekbones aren’t symmetrical. He knows these things and still he can’t bring himself to alter the drawing, too concerned with losing what accuracy he has  already achieved.

The lights dim marginally and the hallway is silent.

If he tilts his head just so, Hannibal can hear Will breathing.

 

* * *

 

It’s nearly a week before Will initiates conversation with him again.

“Tell me a story.” Will demands one evening. Hannibal doesn’t need clarification as to what Will is asking, but he does appreciate specificity.

“Which one?”

“All of them. I want to know what destroyed you.”

Hannibal obliges, and over Miggs’ hoarse moans he paints a picture of murder and survival that he piece-meals from his vast knowledge of the literary world and the various horrors he’s committed in his life.

When he finishes, Miggs has likely lapsed into unconsciousness, but Will is curiously silent.

“You didn’t like my story?”

“No,” Will says, like he can’t decide if he’s irritated. “It was very entertaining, a grand epic for a grand man; but none of it was true.”

Hannibal mentally chastises himself for attempting to lie to Will, a test meant to gauge the extent of his empathy.

“It is a conversation for another time, I should think.” 

“No, please, one day I’d like to understand why you took a knife to me. I believe I deserve that much. All we have here is time.”

 

* * *

 

They live like this for weeks, inexorably intertwined and yet so separated Hannibal has moments of doubt as to whether Will actually exists until Will speaks and the world rights itself again.

 

* * *

 

"Alana thought you loved me.” Will tells him lightly one morning after he’s returned from a session. 

“She was convinced that was the reason you couldn’t outright kill me; because you had feelings for me.”

Hannibal doesn’t feel the need to respond, and Will continues on.

"At first I thought that was absurd. You pretended to be my friend, you nearly killed me a half-dozen times before just as my psychiatrist, even if you weren’t as overt about it.”

Will is quiet, as if trying to gather his thoughts.

“It took me a while to recall what you'd said to me, that night, because all I could think about was the 'I'll eat your heart' line, which admittedly was very sinister," Will breaks off with a small laugh as if his attempted murder was simply an inside joke between friends.

"I am glad you appreciated it." Hannibal smiles, knowing the levity will seep into his tone of voice as Will composes himself to continue on.

"But you didn't mean it,” Will says finally, voice steady. “I remembered what you kept asking me, begging me, when you thought I was dying."

Hannibal waits, because even he cannot recall exactly what he uttered over Will's bloodied body those years ago. The thought is a disconcerting one, denying Hannibal what little power he seems to have here: his memory.

"I let myself get into your head and," Will trails off, Hannibal can hear him breathing rhythmically in a butchered meditation technique. 

"You asked me to forgive you. More than once. At first I thought about Abigail and how her father kept apologizing, telling her it would be alright, and I realized that wasn't it. Hobbs killed those girls to prevent himself from killing his daughter. You,"

Will stops again, but Hannibal genuinely wants to hear what the man has to say.

"You didn't want to kill me. Not really."

"You weren't meat, Will." Hannibal says, filling the silence, and Will just laughs.

"No," Will agrees, word tinged with pained mirth. "I was your _friend_."

"I still consider you to be a friend." Hannibal assuages, and Will just laughs; a breathless sound comprised of more anguish than humor.

 

* * *

 

As time passes, formalities deteriorate and Hannibal feels they're all the better for it.

"Does Chilton even try with you anymore?" Will asks one afternoon, about three months into his incarceration. There isn’t a better word Hannibal can come up with for what this is.

"Not measurably. He sends therapists and psychologists down every now and then. I do my best to unnerve them."

"Sounds about right. Do you threaten to eat them?

"I was a very successful psychotherapist, Will. I know how to exploit an individual to get the results I desire."

"Of course you do."

Hannibal can hear a light tapping. Fingernails on metal; a nervous tic.

"And how are you navigating Chilton's examinations?"

"I feel like I'm loosing my mind. They keep changing my medication. Taking pills away, changing the doses, whatever seems to strike their fancy. One minute I'm hearing voices-"

"Do not be too concerned, that is only me."

"Hearing voices that _aren't_ yours - but don't think I don't hear you whispering to me when you think I'm sleeping - the next I'm hallucinating, smelling things, feeling things," Will's voice is strained, as if he's only now realizing how much of a problem this really is.

“Chilton is attempting to break you.”

“And they keep showing me crime scene photos, autopsy pictures, mostly of cases you were involved with.”

“Likely by forcing the recollection of traumatic memories, housing you next to me and drugging you with questionable substances.”

“He’s not trying to break me, he’s trying to break _you_.”

The revelation is not a new one.

“He is attempting to revert you back to the same state you were in before I was exposed?”

“I can only assume.”

 

* * *

 

“I’m seeing someone.”

“Alana?”

“No, no, she’s,” Will stops, as if realizing he’s said too much. “She’s not Alana.”

“Well,” Hannibal retorts, feeling slighted that Will is reluctant to share. “I do hope she’s still waiting for you after you leave here.” 

Will doesn’t speak to him for a week, and Hannibal can practically hear the man thinking, going over everything he’s said to make sure nothing damning was uttered in the illusion of safety.

“I won’t hurt you, Will. Or her. I have no reason to.”

It’s a peace offering, small and innocent. He means what he says.

“I know that Hannibal,” Will responds, words almost drowned out by Miggs’ incessant babbling.  “I just don’t trust your definition of ‘hurt’.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, you can find me on Tumblr: onawingandaswear.tumblr.com
> 
> Drop by and say hello!


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He doesn’t believe in a power higher than himself, but if he did...if he did, he would think this was a punishment, to take from Hannibal the one pure thing left in his life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a bit of gore in this chapter, not much, but here's your heads up.

 

 

**Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane; Excerpt from Official Transcript; Supervising Therapist: Dr. Frederick Chilton; Patient: Lecter, Hannibal; (13:56, 12/09/2017)**

**//Audio Recording Edited for Content (Federal Authorization: 70392-Crawford, Jack; 6/12/2018)//**

***Recording Start***

_“Did you get what you needed?”_

_“I think so. The mind is a terribly complicated thing, we may not know how Mister Graham’s presence affected you until a much later date.”_

_“The things I’m going to do to your flesh, Frederick. You will regard Abel Gideon’s trespasses as the workings of a petulant child.”_

_“I can see I’ve struck a nerve. That’s still progress, Hannibal.”_

_"Do not test me."_

***Recording End***

 

* * *

 

There are nights where Hannibal will lie on his miserable excuse for a bed, eyes shut against the perpetual glare of recessed halogen lighting, and spend hours describing the crimes he's committed in excruciating detail. 

He did this before Will’s arrival as an experiment to see exactly what he could do to the mental states of the patients in the other cells, then the guards and finally, on some level, himself.

Williams didn’t last more than three weeks, but that was pure intent on Hannibal’s part.

It’s different now. Hannibal has a curiously captive audience in Will. So the experiment continues, despite Hannibal’s better judgement arguing against the decision.

Sometimes, Will tells him to shut up, to fuck off, any number of vulgarities to shock him into silence, but very little shocks a man like himself anymore. 

Other nights, the ones few and far between where Chilton has pushed a thought too deep, or a dosage too high, and Will is silent as the grave. Those are the nights where Hannibal knows Will needs to hear him, the words he's saying, no matter how disturbing, because he needs the connection their shared past provides.

Likewise, if Hannibal has to listen to Miggs furiously masturbate for hours on end, he will make damn sure the man can properly envision what his testicles might look like shoved into his eye sockets.

 

* * *

 

The guards never move Hannibal to recreation when Will is in his cell. An infuriating power-play on Chilton’s part that, to the man’s credit, does set Hannibal slightly on edge.

They spend months like this, and Hannibal just wants to _see_ the other man. A brief look, anything at all to connect to the jaded voice he hears daily with the vibrant corpse he had left behind so many years ago.

The incredibly vain part of Hannibal wants Will to never see him in this state, unkempt and slipping steadily out of his prime; but the increasingly desperate part of him, the part that savored the kill and not the careful feast that followed, doesn't care about judgement or self-conscious behavior.

He just wants to see Will, glimpse the scar that no doubt graces the man's belly, a lasting, glorious marker of Hannibal's ownership.

Guilt and pride war throughout his subconscious, tattering the walls of his palace and destroying years of careful construction. It’s terrifyingly beautiful and Hannibal needs some kind of release lest he crumble within the confines of his own mind.

 

* * *

 

“Do you imagine everyone you meet as a potential culinary dish?”

“Of course not. When you see a steer in a field, or a game bird in the sky do you immediately begin planning a meal around that image? No. You marvel at a creature in its natural environment and move on. You do not hop the fence and slaughter the beast.“

“Please tell me you see the hypocrisy in that statement.”

“Did you see me strutting around Maryland with a scale in one hand and a cleaver in the other?”

“Well, no,”

“I do possess some level of tact, dear Will. Tact, and patience.” 

 

* * *

 

Hannibal doesn’t miss the way their conversations devolve. Will’s questions, his curiosity, are dulled, his mind fuzzy and voice pained.

It’s difficult to witness, even in Hannibal’s stunted way, because this is what Will had predicted. Chilton using Will as a bargaining chip between them.

 

* * *

  

“They upped my meds again. I can’t even identify the pills anymore.”

The announcement is not unexpected.

“How do you feel?”

Will mutters something Hannibal can’t quite understand.

“Pardon?”

“Unstable.” Will repeats. “Like there’s a dozen people in my head and none of them are me.” Will goes silent and Hannibal can hear the man’s rhythmic pacing.

“I thought I was past this,” Will laments, voice heavy with emotion. “I thought I was free of you.”

Hannibal knows this is the beginning of the end. Will is due to be released in a month’s time, and Chilton is running out of options. Running out of chances to break Hannibal.

Desperation, after all, is the father of reckless experimentation, and Chilton is growing very desperate.

“You destroyed me,” Will adds. “Do you understand? Everything you did, everything you foisted upon me, what you made people believe,” he trails off. “I trusted you to take care of me.”

Hannibal glances around his cell. “Evidently a mistake.”

“Tell me why. Tell me why I was so appealing.” The sentence rolls off Will’s tongue with the cloying thickness of despair and reluctant curiosity.

“I considered you a friend. I was concerned that with the treatment of your encephalitis, you would lose the very qualities that made us compatible. I should have possessed more faith in your mental faculties, and for that I apologize.”

Hannibal is half surprised by his own admission and presses a thumb hard to the bridge of his nose as Will laughs ruefully, the sound bordering on hysterical.

“Just like that. Just like that you think I’ll forget that you made everyone think it was me? That I was the Chesapeake Ripper?”

Hannibal’s head throbs dully with the beginnings of a tension headache.

“I do not expect anything from you, Will. All I can do is attempt to convey my personal truth and hope that it is a sufficient balm for your wounds.”

Hannibal receives no response and after several minutes assumes Will has lapsed into unconsciousness.

“You wear your fuck-toy out, Lecter?”

Miggs. Always Miggs.

“I would advise you to hold your tongue.” Hannibal replies, the dull ache behind his eyes now a throbbing pain.

One month. Just four weeks until Will is gone again and Hannibal is free to do as he pleases.

 

* * *

 

“I don’t think Molly will like me like this,” Hannibal catches one evening, shortly after their dinner trays have been removed and he’s trying to recapture the gentle curves of Bedelia Du Maurier’s face with blunted charcoal. “She doesn’t like it when I talk about work.”

“Molly?” He inquires, though truthfully Hannibal knows this must be the woman Will had mentioned not long ago.

“My girlfriend. You don’t get to eat her, she’s nice to me.”

Will clucks his tongue oddly.

“Shit, I think they drugged my food.”

Hannibal allows his lip to curl into a sneer. The rest of their conversation is unintelligible and it takes an hour to smudge away the black streak he makes in anger.

For all his effort, Bedelia's cheekbones are jagged and inhuman.

He can't fix it.

 

* * *

 

Hannibal wakes to the echoes of severe gastric distress and it takes seconds to realize that the sound is coming from Will’s cell.

“Will?”

“Back to bed, Lecter.” Phillips tells him when he presses himself against the reinforced plexiglass, fruitlessly attempting to catch a glimpse of whatever medical emergency is occurring just out of sight.

“What is wrong with him?” Hannibal demands.

“Graham, I need you to acknowledge you can understand me.”

“Back to bed!”

Miggs is crowing something vile Hannibal chooses to ignore before he catches sight of a gurney.

“Will.” Hannibal asks again, concern slipping into his voice.

“Lecter, Miggs, I swear to Christ,”

Phillips moves in front of Hannibal’s cell, his large form blocking what little view he had to begin with.

“He’ll be fine,” Phillips tells him, hard expression belaying the comfort the words should provide. “Go back to bed.”

When the guard finally moves, the gurney is gone, the echoing slam of the security gate the only lingering sign of its presence at all.

Hannibal doesn’t sleep that night. Nor does he try to.

  

* * *

 

Hannibal doesn’t dream. 

He has nightmares. Terrors that shock him awake and send his pulse racing. He doesn’t dream.

Except for when he does.

 

* * *

 

On the night Will is confined to the infirmary, Hannibal closes his eyes and opens them again miles away, to find himself in his study over Will Graham’s rapidly cooling corpse.

Hannibal is not awake, he knows this, but he is in a lucid state, and he recognizes that he’s envisioning what could have been had he been more intent on ending Will’s life. 

Soon, however, control slips away. With every breath foreign thoughts flood his consciousness, and something pained swells in his chest. Reality shifts, and the man before him is not his friend, but his lover.

Hannibal has done something terrible. 

Unforgivable.  

 

* * *

 

Will is not meat. 

 

* * *

 

So when Hannibal lays out Will’s body on a stainless steel examination table in his basement, he is wholly unclear how to proceed. 

In the end, he starts by winding Will’s small intestines back into his abdomen. Wiping away the blood and bile Hannibal himself had wrongly drawn from the man in the first place.

There is a part of Hannibal, a small, naive piece, that hopes his actions are enough; that putting everything back in its rightful place will cause Will to magically reawaken. He even grasps Will’s stiff hand, lacing their fingers in the hope that when his lover awakens he’ll greet Hannibal with that same tired smile as always.

But Will doesn’t open his eyes; his body stays stiff with rigor and ropey intestine slides from his gut like a snake on a cold morning.

Hannibal braces his arms on the side of the table and leans down, resting his cheek on Will’s still chest, unflinchingly aware of the still heart beneath. The meat, the muscle that carried Will through Hannibal’s life cooling and stiffening under his watchful gaze and he can’t let Will go to waste.

Hannibal cuts quickly to drain the blood and preserve the organs, trying valiantly not to think of his beloved sister and the dozens of unworthy men and women who came after her, never able to do his psychosis justice.

Still he cuts, and he carves, hollowing Will’s chest and abdomen while leaving the ribcage intact. From above the pectorals, Will looks untarnished, as if only sleeping through a haze of noir celluloid.

Hannibal separates the organs, examining each in turn with a meticulous eye, memorizing every detail, every slick curve, irregular dip, the color, the smell. He cradles Will’s heart in his hands, and although he rationally knows that love is a hormonal impulse triggered within the brain, he presses a kiss to the still muscle in a homage to zeitgeist symbology. 

“Will,” he says, savoring the feel of his lips against the organ. “I am truly sorry.”

Will opens his eyes but does not answer, and Hannibal believes that may be for the best.

 

* * *

 

Hannibal wakes with the taste of bile on his tongue and clean, red crescent moons cut into the palms of his hands.

He can’t hear Will breathing. 

He doesn’t believe in a power higher than himself, but if he did...if he did, he would think this was a punishment, to take from Hannibal the one pure thing left in his life.

But he doesn’t believe in God, or Allah, or Krishna, or Zeus or Quetzalcoatl or any mythological figure that exists to shoulder the blame for the follies of man.

He doesn’t believe in god, but if he did, he would think Will was a punishment.

 

* * *

  

Will returns two days later, and after being re-situated in his cell greets Hannibal with, “Apparently I managed to ingest the wrong pills. My mistake.”

Hannibal’s relief overrides his seething rage, if for a moment.

“The only possible explanation, of course.” he says, dry lips catching on the words.

“Of course.” Will responds.

Two weeks. Hannibal reminds himself. Just two more weeks and Will shall be rid of this place and rid of him.

 

* * *

 

Will almost makes Hannibal feel human again; like after all this time he still has some stake in this world, that his lot in life is not to simply cull the herd.

“I wonder what it would take to break you.” Hannibal ponders one afternoon, and Will answers with his requisite exasperated sigh.

“How do you know you didn’t?”

Hannibal does not realize this will be their last conversation.

 

* * *

 

Will disappears on a thursday.

To where, Hannibal cannot say. Presumably to whatever home has replaced the stalwart fortress that was once provided by Wolf Trap, Virginia.

This is done while he is otherwise occupied being hosed down in what passes for a shower. When Hannibal returns to his cell, feeling residual mortification over his sallow skin and lank, greying hair after viewing himself in a proper mirror, he does his standard glance into Will's perpetually empty cell. Only the room is different in those subtle ways that belie the lack of an actual occupant.

The bed is neat. Toilet paper has been removed from its holder. Books, letters, anything personal is gone, swept away, no doubt, to be over analyzed by individuals not fit to lick the boot-heels of their intended subject of study.

Miggs howls at him for nearly an hour, Hannibal responds by folding himself onto his cot, lacing his fingers across his abdomen, and venturing into what remains of his mental palace.

 

* * *

 

In another plane of consciousness, Hannibal offers Will a glass of wine. They fuck on a bed of furs in a land that is no longer his birthright. 

He pretends that he was whole enough to protect Will from the deviancies so ingrained in his subconscious.

It's all fabrication, but it's a small measure of peace.

 

* * *

 

Chilton pokes and prods about Will, asking invasive, intimate questions whose answers Hannibal could never hope to be privy to.

His life slides back into the same monotony as before, but for all that Will’s presence brought some measure of peace to Hannibal’s troubled thoughts, he is more restless than ever before.

He returns from his latest session to a haphazard pile of mail; medical journals, magazines and inane letters spilling over one another and covering a large portion of Bedelia’s face.

He takes the time, as always, to filter through the contents of every delivery. This is, after all, the only real entertainment he has left.

Perhaps this is why, on the third day of sorting, Hannibal is so struck by the discovery of a single letter, transcribed onto toilet paper and signed, not with an identifiable signature, but with an imprint of teeth.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, you can find me on Tumblr: onawingandaswear.tumblr.com
> 
> Drop by and say hello!


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “They know you were the one communicating with Dolarhyde,” Chilton says, insincerity pulling at the corner of his mouth. “And they know you’re the one responsible for Graham’s death.”

**Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane; After Incident Report; Supervisor: Eric Phillips; Patient(s) Involved: Lecter, Hannibal; (01/19/2018)**

**//Transcript Edited for Content (Federal Authorization: 70392-Crawford, Jack; 6/12/2018)//**

**Excerpt:**

_“Around four a.m, roughly, patient became unsettled, speaking incoherently and was monitored for several minutes by closed-circuit surveillance before beginning to thrash and yell hysterically for nearly thirty seconds. Outburst ceased when neighboring patients began to wake and engaged in further noise disturbance._

_Lecter, the patient in question, proved to be asleep through the entire ordeal. Medical assistance was not required. On duty staff regarded the event as a ‘night terror’.”_

 

* * *

 

**Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane; Excerpt from After Incident Report Interview: Inmate Supervisor Eric Phillips; Facility Supervisor: Frederick Chilton; Patient(s) Involved: Lecter, Hannibal; (05/28/2018)**

**//Recording Edited for Content (Federal Authorization: 70392-Crawford, Jack; 6/12/2018)//**

***Recording Start***

_“And what, exactly, did Doctor Lecter say to you?”_

_“He said, he said he didn’t need to kill me.”_

_“He let you go? He killed the other staff on duty, and let you survive?”_

_“He told me I hadn’t embarrassed myself like the others, and that If I-”_

_“Yes?”_

_“If I opened the door, he wouldn’t go after my family.”_

_“And you believed him?”_

_“I believed he’d kill me if I didn’t. I saw what he did to David and Roy, I didn’t trust him, but, but I’m alive. Unemployed, but alive.”_

***Recording Stop***

 

* * *

 

Hannibal reads the letter twice before destroying it.

It’s almost mournful, the way the delicate paper dissolves when it touches the water; growing transparent to show the dull grey of the stainless steel beneath. Inked confessions blurring quickly.

‘Avid Fan’ is a man, developed in body but suffering severe emotional and mental distress likely due to familial mistreatment in his youth. The manner in which he addresses Lecter is highly reminiscent to that of an abused child, desperate for affirmation and fearful of unwarranted retaliation; his conditioned reaction to submit to his betters while determining the best ways to please, simultaneously resenting the role and longing for it.

He recalls, briefly, Franklin Froideveaux: the man’s simpering demeanor and pervasive desire to ‘touch greatness’. The author is a man of Franklin’s yearning character, but in possession of Tobias Budge’s rampant internal demons.

Hannibal is fascinated, but not in a manner that lends itself to clear action. There is only so much one can do from the sub-basement of a mental institution.

The deteriorating paper spirals away quickly and Hannibal knows the author in question has killed before and will likely kill again. It truly is a shame Hannibal is no longer shadowing Crawford’s team; he would quite enjoy witnessing this killer operate with such reluctant motivations.

Hannibal will simply have to live vicariously through handwritten communication. 

He cannot respond through conventional means, but it seems his ‘Avid Fan’ has thought of that as well, and there are fantastically creative instructions for return communication.

Perhaps he will have a role to play in this story after all.

 

* * *

 

Hannibal arranges an interview with a graduate student (another ‘avid fan’, though this one is substantially less driven to conspicuous homicide) and easily talks the man into leaving a comment on Tattlecrime’s latest _‘Where are they now?’_ article regarding Hannibal’s own incarceration.

Just a little something to get the ball rolling and provide some much needed entertainment.

It is far from a difficult intellectual leap to connect the anonymous letters with the ‘Tooth Fairy’ of growing infamy that has touched so many of his mindless correspondences of late.

Hannibal wonders how long it will take for Chilton and the others to realize what he already knows.

 

* * *

 

Hannibal’s sketches become increasingly surreal in the weeks after Will’s departure. Much like the clocks he’d requested of his counterpart so long ago, his artwork is a bellwether of his stability, of his unwavering control of his faculties. 

He tests himself; sketching buildings and intricate architecture. Bodies and faces. The guards sneer quietly at his requests for paper and graphite. It is not until one morning when, palms smeared with grey-black charcoal dust, that he blinks and realizes he’s not sketching fair Bedelia, but his mother, with her angelic hair and bright, lifeless eyes.

Hannibal doesn't finish the piece. 

If he possessed the capacity to do so, he would burn it. 

 

* * *

 

‘Avid Fan’ must receive his message, because the next few letters - spaced closely together and containing far more detail than before - take a significantly darker tone. Hannibal can only assume that he it witnessing the final unraveling of a man who recognizes the hounds are circling. 

The change, however, comes in the form of the man’s misplaced hero worship and his desire to please Hannibal and an unknown force by ‘correcting his unfortunate failures’. 

Truthfully, Hannibal has no real understanding of what this might mean. He can only assume the man is suggesting the perceived failures in technique leading up to Hannibal’s capture; his failure to remain free.

All of this, however is meaningless in the face of what Hannibal _is_ able to ascertain: the Tooth Fairy wishes to kill him. Though this may be an act of deference in the man’s eyes, Hannibal cannot abide such blatant disrespect.

 

* * *

 

Hannibal invites the student back and plants a second message, this one much more important than the first. If he is unable to destroy this dragon-obsessed psychopath, perhaps Will can do the honors.

He falls asleep to an imagined scene of Will, his dear Will, choking the life out of his faceless ‘Avid Fan’.

If he wakes screaming to a different image altogether, that is no business but his own.

 

* * *

  

Chilton orders that his books and writing utensils be confiscated. An unnecessary action, given his arguably passive behavior these last few months, but dear Frederick’s mind is so very unconventional. Infantile, really.

Regardless, without a lack of outside stimuli, Hannibal’s attentions have no choice but to turn inward. As a result, the dreams return with alarming frequency, though Hannibal begins to regard them a bit more as hysterical delusions.

He, for one, is not keen on such a diagnosis, but time and circumstance will do terrifying things to even to most adept of minds.

Thankfully, his mental palace is untouched, but he cannot maintain a state of meditation at all times; despite his best efforts.

There is a silver lining to the deterioration of his mental prowess, however, and that gleaming prize is the Will Graham he fabricates in his subconscious mind.

 

* * *

 

He catches the scent of jasmine and tenses the muscles in his hand to trail his rough nails across the fabric of his trousers, forgetting, if only for a moment, that his garment is provided by the state.

“Doctor Bloom.” Hannibal says. He does not need to open his eyes to know the woman that stands before his cell.

“Hannibal.” Alana responds, voice stiff, not with reluctance, but desperation.

“Surely you must be hesitant to seek my council again, so tell me: what crisis are you facing that demands you resort to such measures?”

Hannibal moves to stand, rising from his bed with all the grace this moment deserves.

“Jack sent me.”

“In Will’s stead, I should assume?”

Hannibal meets her eyes and marvels at what damage time has wrought upon Alana Bloom; though, in all fairness, he did have his part to play. 

“I have been advised not to speak to you about him, not that I was planning on doing that to begin with,” the halogen lighting in the hallway makes her newly dyed hair glint dully. “I’m hear to talk to you about-”

“The Tooth Fairy. Really not a difficult fact to ascertain.”

“Given you’ve been corresponding with him.” Alana bites, hands perched on her hips, elbows bent wide. The stance reminiscent of an outdoorsman attempting to make themselves appear larger in the presence of a predator.

“Not entirely accurate,” Hannibal tells her mirroring her authoritative position. “He has been sending mail to me, I have not reciprocated the action.”

“That remains to be seen.” she scoffs, and Hannibal notes the slight smear of mauve lipstick that appears on her central incisor.

Hannibal thinks back to Jack. To Chilton stealing away his amenities one by one. To the indignities Will has suffered at the hands of so many tasked with his protection. And he thinks of Alana, standing here before him with the resolute posturing of a woman convinced of her deductive reasoning. 

“What do you wish to know?”

“Tell me why you did it. Why you sent Dolarhyde after Will.”

“Dolarhyde?” Hannibal lets the name sit heavy on his tongue, meaningless despite its weight. “I assumed he would be working this case, given the conditions of his institutionalization.”

Alana blinks back surprise. “So it was true, he was here.”

“Not ten feet from where you are standing.”

Her face flushes with anger but the moment is forgotten when Phillips calls out. “Doctor Bloom.”

They both turn at the address, but Hannibal mentally chastises himself when he can’t see anything beyond the edge of his cell.

“There’s an urgent message for you in the office.”

Alana makes a face and points a finger at Hannibal. “We’re not done here,” she says, turning away. 

Hannibal can’t help but think she’s mistaken in that assumption.

 

* * *

 

True to form, Alana does not return, instead Hannibal is visited by a much less friendly face.

“They know you were the one communicating with Dolarhyde,” Chilton says, insincerity pulling at the corner of his mouth. “And they know you’re the one responsible for Graham’s death.”

The room tilts sharply and Chilton smiles indulgently.

“Oh, did your contacts not pass that tidbit on? Dolarhyde mutilated him. It’s a shame we won’t get the chance to study either of them. I have petitioned for Graham’s brain, purely for study. If you’re good, I might even let you see it.”

Hannibal blinks and Chilton is gone, the lights dimmed slightly. The clock glows 22:14.

 

* * *

 

Hannibal tries to sleep. 

  

* * *

 

He can feel the blood seep beneath his gloves where his hands are wrist deep in the man’s chest, and he realizes he’s speaking platitudes; pleading with him not to die, not tonight, but the heart monitor stutters and trills its own damning response and Hannibal curses in languages he knows the other staff cannot identify.

The man’s eyes are open. Pale blue set in a face coated with dirt and congealed blood and bound by an oxygen mask, and Hannibal knows those eyes. 

He’s seen them a hundred times: watching him sleepily from across a breakfast table, crinkling at the corners with irritation when Hannibal mentions anything to do with either of their professions and _no, please no, not him._

But Will looks at him with unmitigated serenity. Even in this moment, in an operating theatre that reeks of antiseptic and blood, Will is remarkable. 

Hannibal’s hand slips, brushing something vital and precious and the monitor screams _‘murderer’_ in its dead little tone, and he blinks as the room burns to ash and ice around him; Will dissolving into nothingness, the heart muscle in his hands too small, too fragile to have belonged to more than a child.

_Will._

_Mischa._

 

* * *

 

Hannibal wakes to the blare of an automated alarm, mouth dry and throat burning with the ache of unconscious vocalization. 

He decides he’s had enough. Enough of Chilton’s posturing, enough of Miggs’ obscene screeching and more than enough sub-par cuisine to last him a lifetime. No more mind games, no more toleration of pawns and the fools that lead them.

With a clarity of thought brought only by despair, he realizes what Dolarhyde intended when he spoke of Hannibal's failure. His unfinished work. His last kill.

Hannibal has played his hand and lost.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, drop by and say hello: onawingandaswear.tumblr.com


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Only then does he notice the small type running the bottom of the (surprisingly) uncredited photograph.
> 
> 'Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham at the scene of the Mitchell-Winder double murder; Easton, Maryland, April 2014, three months prior to Lecter’s grisly attempt on Graham’s life.' 
> 
> There is a second photograph beneath the first, its obscene content guarded protectively by Hannibal’s palm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Super sorry for the delay. I'm getting ready to move, and my trip to San Diego is just days away, so things have been pretty hectic.

**Seized Footage; WYFF-4 Greenville, South Carolina, Eyewitness Interview: Stephen Morris Hayes. (00/00/00). Clip length: Seventeen (17) Seconds.**

  ***Recording Start***

_“So you saw Hannibal Lecter?”_

_“I don’t, I mean, it looked like him, but I didn’t know he’d escaped at the time. I thought that would be profiling.”_

_“What did he purchase from your store?”_

_“He...he bought a lighter and...and a book.”_

_“Do you remember the title? Anything about what he was reading? Did you see him look at any newspapers, or maps?”_

_“I...I don’t. I’m sorry. Can, can we be finished? I have to get back to work-”_

 

***End Recording***

 

 

* * *

 

Once Hannibal is able to clear his mind and compartmentalize the most inane, inappropriate aspects of his grief, it isn’t difficult to ramshackle a plan of escape.

On Thursday evenings, only one man stands guard over the facility's most dangerous patients. That man is 'Officer' Hildebrand, an individual spikes his coffee with too much Irish Cream liquor and spends at least three hours of his shift, the ‘slowest’, between one and five a.m., inebriated. This has been a gradual process, beginning eight months prior with thr slow dissolution of his marriage.

It's almost a pity how easy a target the man makes of himself. 

“Excuse me?” Hannibal calls out. “Hildebrand?”

“What, Lecter?” is the slightly slurred reply.

“There seems to be something amiss with my accommodations.”

Hildebrand groans, irritation evident.

“My sink is overflowing.”

Hannibal waits. One beat.

Two.

Three.

Four.

“Then turn it off.”

Success. 

“Obviously.” Hannibal replies. “However, on this occasion, I believe I require additional assistance.”

Hannibal hears the creak of metal that precedes the unlocking of the security gate and keeps his grin of pleasure to himself. Hildebrand appears, brow furrowed with a scowl and reeking of stale sweat.

“Alright. You know the drill: up against the wall, hands behind your head.”

Hannibal complies, braces one leg slightly behind the other, and waits for the slide of the lock. 

He inhales slowly. Exhales. 

Hannibal feels the cool slide of the restraints, kicks out a leg and twists.

He’s spent years honing himself, mind body and spirit, into a finely-tuned weapon. It should come as no surprise he is easily able to overpower his jailers; men trained to employ the use of baton, taser and firearm in lieu of intellect and agility.

It should be harder than it is to walk out of the hospital. Frederick needs to know how poor his security really is. Just to be certain, Hannibal leaves a note.

They can’t be letting the criminally insane run rampant, after all. 

Someone might get hurt.

 

* * *

 

It is not until Hannibal is combing the shelves of a truck stop on the border of West Virginia that he finds a copy of Freddie Lounds’ ‘New York Times Bestseller’ _Hannibal the Cannibal: the rise and fall of the Chesapeake Ripper._

The black and white photos gathered on the glossy center pages show everything from his former home to media documentation of the trial; but there, on the last of the photo pages, directly opposite a heading designating ‘Chapter Twelve: A Dish Best Served Cold’, are two photos Hannibal has never seen. The first is a cropped crime scene photograph, Hannibal himself standing tall and barely recognizable in a suit long since auctioned off by Maryland Law Enforcement; his hair thick and perfectly coiffed against a background of FBI agents and behind him, just off to the side, enough to make the distance less pronounced in the picture, is Will Graham; watching Hannibal with a curiously dark expression that one could easily mistake for affection. 

Hannibal slides his fingers down the slick expanse of the page, covering the bottom half of Will’s face to gain an unburdened view of the man’s expression, but all he can decipher, even from his psychology background, is that Will has knowledge of the subject he is observing. A comforting thought, Hannibal acknowledges, but not one that means anything substantial. 

Only then does he notice the small type running the bottom of the (surprisingly) uncredited photograph.

_Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham at the scene of the Mitchell-Winder double murder; Easton, Maryland, April 2014, three months prior to Lecter’s grisly attempt on Graham’s life._

There is a second photograph beneath the first, its obscene content guarded protectively by Hannibal’s palm.

He may be a monster, but Will is, was, his friend, despite the carnage Hannibal inflicted upon him. He lifts his thumb to reveal a wide expanse of pale skin. A thigh. His fingers trail away, and there is Will, bare on a hospital bed, Hannibal’s shame visible for all to see.

Tubes, sutures, bandages. Catheters and colostomy bags. The discolored flesh that belies major trauma beneath.

There is no black bar, only slight pixelation to blur Will’s nudity, and Hannibal knows what finally broke the man.

 _“I am on your side,”_ Hannibal had told Will once, a lifetime ago in a room that was the culmination of every success Hannibal had ever achieved for himself.

 _“I think you might be the only one.”_ Will had replied, and Hannibal remembers the small pleasure he had found in such a statement.

His breath is hot in his throat and he realizes he’s wrinkling the page, fingerprints garishly outlined atop the monochromatic expanse of Will’s body; his right ring finger hovering diligently over Will’s genitals, hiding them from his own sight.

“Hey, sir,” he hears. “Are you alright? Can I help you find something?”

Hannibal closes the book and retrieves a bottle of water from the humming refrigeration unit. 

“If you’re into that crime stuff, there are a couple magazines talking about that ‘Tooth Fairy’ guy,” the clerk continues, heedless of Hannibal’s discomfort.

The idea of a southern housewife gawking at the images within Lounds’ ‘book’ is repulsive. He tries not to think of the tens of thousand of copies of the same publication cycling through libraries and thrift shops, forgotten and tossed away once _‘Hannibal the Cannibal’_ had faded from the media spotlight. Once Will Graham was acquitted of all charges and deemed to have not been Hannibal’s illicit lover. Once another psychotic individual had displaced him in the nightmares of the American people. Once another celebrity grew heavy with child.

Tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of photographs of an exposed Will Graham that the world felt entitled to, tossed aside like yesterday’s garbage when the fancy passed.

“Do you carry waterproof matches?” Hannibal asks of the cashier, and the man looks up at him; helpfully attentive, but with sleep-tired eyes.

“Nah, but we’ve got some decent lighters. Windproof.”

The man fumbles behind the counter, beneath a rack of scratch-cards and smokeless tobacco, before coming up with a prepackaged, stainless-steel Zippo and an apologetic expression.

“The owner likes to up-sell, so he stopped carrying the cheap ones.”

“It’s fine.” Hannibal lies, setting the bottle on the counter. The condensation makes his fingers damp around the plastic of a credit card Hannibal liberated from the wallet of a distracted motorist.

“Do you still want the book?”

Hannibal looks down. He hadn’t realized he was still holding the offending chronicle of his own misadventures. 

“My apologies,” Hannibal tells him, setting the book next to the water. “Something to pass the time. Ah,” he remembers, catching sight of the disposable cellular phones along the back wall. “And whichever of those has the most pre-programed minutes.”

“Lose your phone, did you?”

“Business, my new plan has yet to rollover fully.”

Hannibal notices the man’s name-tag reads _‘Scott’,_ a detail that had eluded his notice for a majority of the conversation.

Anger mingles with resignation. He’s rusty, his mind only now recalibrating and adjusting to the realities placed before him. Reality versus what passed for it in a ten-by-twelve prison.

“Just so you know,” ‘Scott’ says amiably, tallying the price with purposefully delayed motion. “That book is trash. Entertaining, yeah, but it’s garbage.”

Hannibal watches the man carefully, and slips a hand into his jacket to palm the grip of the pistol.

“Garbage, Mr. Scott?”

The man laughs, and his hands never drift below the counter to the panic button Hannibal knows waits beneath.

“Just Scott, sir, and, no, that book is just a ton of speculation. I mean, yeah, there’s truth in there, about the murders and what happened with the FBI, but she accuses a bunch of people of being in on it. Like there was some big conspiracy. Like that guy, Graham?” 

Hannibal realizes the man is looking for an affirmation that he understands the untold intricacies of the conversation, and he inclines his head slightly for Scott to continue.

“That profiler guy? The author claims he was not only _in_ on the murders, but sleeping with the Chesapeake Ripper! Total bullshit,” he looks surprised at his candid speech and lifts a placating hand. “Sorry, language. I sometimes forget my audience.”

Hannibal relaxes his wrist, the hard ridges of the pistol grip slipping away from his fingers.

“No apologies necessary, I have not heard this story, please feel free to continue.”

Scott flushes and drums his fingers on the countertop.

“Thanks, but I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead. Wrong or no.”

“Dead?” Something cold drops in Hannibal’s stomach.

“Lounds? You didn’t hear about that? The Tooth Fairy got to her after she ran a smear piece on him. Well, as much a smear as you can run on a serial killer.”

“Freddie Lounds is dead.” Hannibal repeats for his own edification, and Scott nods. 

“They caught the killer, but he offed himself before they could do anything.”

“The things I’ve missed.” Hannibal says glibly.

“Listen, you seem like a pretty decent guy,” Scott tells him and moves away to rifle through a stack of magazines Hannibal assumes have yet to be added to the display. “TIME has a good piece on serial killers and Dolarhyde, the Tooth Fairy, you might like this a bit more.” 

The magazine is placed atop the book, covering Hannibal’s own distorted, masked visage.

“Perhaps” Hannibal takes his purchases from the counter. “You have been very helpful, Scott. I thank you for your input.”

“Glad I could help.” Scott calls back. “Have a nice day, Sir.”

Hannibal wonders if the man will ever realize whom, exactly, he was conversing with. 

 

* * *

 

Hannibal spends several crucial hours parked off a county road, flipping through Lounds’ libelous book, his fingers catching every now and then on the thin print paper indicative of a cheap publishing house.

Within he finds Will, Jack, himself; a litany of players in a game Hannibal had orchestrated and, according to some, lost. He finds the damning chapter regarding his own infatuation with Will and sneers at the vulgarity of the passages within. 

He finds several pages mentioning his youth and dear Mischa, but nothing close to accurate beyond the bare bones of his parent’s deaths and his own admittance to a Soviet-operated boys home.

He wonders, absently, if Will ever took the time to read this through, if it made him more sympathetic or less surprised by what Hannibal has ultimately become.

Then he continues on to the testimonial chapters and all concerns about legitimacy are lost to the ether.

He almost wishes he had the time to catalogue the names of every individual that had chosen to speak out against him in the years following his capture; wrongly convinced of the infallibility of the American justice system. So many of his former colleagues and acquaintances rising up for their moment of recognition.

_“I shudder to think what might have happened had he ever gotten me alone! To think, I survived the Chesapeake Ripper!”_

Sandra Premett. Baltimore socialite and pathological liar. He’d never actually spoken to her outside of charity-related events.

_“We always knew there was something off about him.”_

Dr. David Fyer. A pathetic excuse for an Internist. Hannibal had been his supervisor less than a week before the man had been ‘let go’ due to ‘budget cuts’.

 _“Well, I’m not proud to say I was a frequent dinner guest,”_ another passage reads. “ _Needless to say, I’m vegan now. Cruelty-free. It’s just so hard eating anything you know was alive.”_

Hannibal outright laughs. Cynthia Belrose. A ‘cause of the week’ activist that could be found protesting animal cruelty in the spring and donning mink in the fall. 

His mind spins, and he longs for the easy weight of a blade in his hand. For now, however, it has become necessary to seek asylum. Hannibal has spent years anticipating this moment, and he does not relish the task set out before him.

Hannibal rips open the package containing the phone and takes a moment to program it before dialing a number he’s long since memorized for such an occasion. He waits through several tones before a deep, sleep-tired voice answers, muttering, _“Speak.”_

“My dear, Mason. Is that how you greet an old friend?”

 

  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> onawingandaswear.tumblr.com


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I have no desire to eat you,” Hannibal explains, tightening the restraints with precise motion. “You are contaminated. Diseased,” he pulls at the leather strap until he can hear bones creak over Verger’s empty moaning. “A truly disgusting human being.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies all around for the lateness of the chapter, it's been crazy the last two weeks! So, here's your reward, 4,000 words of Hannibal fucking up Mason Verger.

The mansion is obscenely large, even at a distance; however, the estate is not without some measure of taste and decorum. 

Aristocracy as envisioned by the _nouveau riche_.

“Do you like it?” Mason questions as they pass the security gate. “I hired a designer out of Zurich, you understand, to bring a European feel to several of my stateside properties.”

Hannibal hums, something that the other man must take as approval, because he grins broadly. 

“I knew you would appreciate it.”

Mason is toned and lithe beneath his tracksuit, brimming with the kind of whip-cord strength that serves flight over fight. His size, features and general cadence imply a genial, trusting nature, but Hannibal knows from experience that monstrous deviance lurks beneath Verger’s pampered flesh: a Tobias Budge of a different age and in possession of far less admirable proclivities. Nonetheless, Hannibal is owed quite a debt by the man, one he intends fully to collect.

“You caught me off guard, Hannibal,” Mason chides, motioning to his attire with a half-empty whiskey tumbler.

The ice clinks against the walls of the glass and Hannibal wonders, idly, what Mason is attempting to impart by flaunting his wealth so early in this exercise. Not that Hannibal is disappointed, by any means, but Mason has always been predictable in his efforts at subterfuge.

“So tell me more about this cannibalism nonsense. I’ve read so much about it, but I would rather hear all the dirty details from the man himself. Tell me, all these years? Even when you and I first crossed paths?”

“Quite.” Hannibal does not elaborate. He doesn't need to. Mason's imagination will run wild with the possibilities of Hannibal's actions, with no need for prompting. This game between the two of them has always been one of control, patience; at least, such can be said on Hannibal’s part. Mason has never been one for subtlety or finesse.

“My,” Verger laughs. “And here I thought I was the only one of us with a taste for the unorthodox. Now, had I known you’d be gracing me with your presence, I’d have made prior arrangements. As it stands, however, we will have to keep ourselves entertained. _Somehow_.”

Verger’s hand drifts to Hannibal’s thigh, neatly trimmed fingernails shining with the remnants of an unnecessary manicure. Hannibal watches the fingers kneed the worn denim of his stolen jeans and imagines how much force is necessary to break each of Verger’s fingers in succession.

“That never seemed to be a matter of concern before now, _Mason._ ” Hannibal drawls pouring as much irreverent lust into the sentence as he can muster. Which must be enough because Verger flushes and adjusts himself with his free hand.

Hannibal wants nothing more than to flay this man alive; cut him open while he still draws breath and expose every vile organ and muscle tendon that keeps him functioning, _breathing_.

“True,” Mason continues. “However, if you choose to stay, an excellent option given your less than clean name, I’m sure I can find us something to play with; show you how the other half truly lives.” 

He is not a hypocrite. He recognizes the parallels in their arguably destructive behavior, but Hannibal would be remiss to ever harm a child. For the longest time, he could barely lift a finger to harm a woman. He has class, sophistication, an insatiable appetite for the macabre, but even _he_ can be disgusted.

“Of course,” Hannibal lies, covering Mason’s hand with his own. “I am quite certain you will be able to hunt down some form of entertainment. Until then?”

“ _Until then_ , I'm not fond of sharing.” Mason wets his lips with his tongue and the conversation ends with the car’s arrival at the front entrance of the home.

Verger lives only as a final resort, and the man, as well as his money, will serve their intended purpose.

 

* * *

 

“My bodyguard, Margot,” Mason nods at the statuesque woman seated near the entryway and Hannibal frowns. If the woman is surprised at the presence of a wanted fugitive, she does not show it; her features stern and gaze steely.

“Your sister, Margot?”

“One and the same. Now she’s all grown up, a muff diver, unsurprisingly, and so _strong_. Just to protect herself from me, right baby sister?” He doesn’t wait for a response before barreling on. “But now she uses all that strength to protect _me_.”

“I hope you are at least being compensated fairly.” Hannibal says, addressing the woman evenly, and she nods in response, but not before Mason cuts in, voice irritated.

“She’s paid just fine.”

“I would hope so, given the extensive damage you have inflicted upon her person.”

“You are a guest in my home, _Doctor Lecter,_ ” Mason hisses. “If you want to discuss my sister’s cunt, feel free to do so on someone else’s time.”

Hannibal holds up a placating hand.

“I meant no disrespect, Mason, to you or your past endeavors. I was simply curious as to how you have managed to maintain such a strong hold on one of your past victims.”

Mason seems assuaged and grins with barely disguised pleasure. Margot only looks curious. Hannibal has to give her some credit, for all the horror Mason has brought into her life, she’s smart enough to wait her brother out.

“Of course, Hannibal, how foolish of me. We can discuss details over dinner, I think.”

He wonders if Margot is as eager to see Mason die as he is.

 

* * *

 

“She needs my semen.” Mason tells him over a mediocre stew of veal and shallots. 

Hannibal doesn’t miss that the chef is serving only dishes that do not require to use of overly sharp silverware. “Irony of ironies, isn’t it? I can’t risk fucking her, else she gets exactly what she wants from me.”

Hannibal feigns sympathy and prods at the overcooked meat.

“ _A child_ ,” he groans, tearing at a crust of french bread. “For her and her bitch lover.”

“How is it you have managed to maintain such a hold on her?”

Mason grins and raises his wine glass in a toast.

“Daddy dearest didn’t leave her a penny in his will. Left it all to his 'male heir'. I own her, more now than I did when she was young.”

Mason tosses a scrap of bread to the floor where it is quickly devoured by a menacing looking dog Hannibal recognizes as an oversized Asian breed.

“Your father did you quite a service in your youth,” Hannibal offers, but Verger grimaces. 

“He did his fair share of shit to me as well, make no mistake.”

Mason waves off the beast of a hound and Hannibal offers it a chunk of beef, meat that is taken gladly before the creature is whisked away by a large man with an earpiece.

“A Tibetan Mastiff,” Mason says proudly. “Cost eight-hundred thousand. You know what that bloodline is used for? Even today? They’re bred to fight off tigers in rural villages and protect livestock. Damn things are almost feral. But every litter nets me about half a million, so the stud was a decent investment.”

“You have a kennel on site?” Hannibal asks.

“Of course, but Zeus roams the main house, he doubles as a guard dog. I’ve seen him remove limbs before, quite a show, really, I think you’d enjoy it. Maybe if you’re good, I’ll let you take one of the pups with you. You can train it to eat the people you don’t want to.”

Hannibal taps his heel on the area rug beneath the table.

“Unfortunately, training an animal may not be the best use of my time.”

Mason hums in agreement before pushing aside his plate.

“No, I guess not. Dessert?”

“I would not refuse if you have something prepared.”

Mason winks at him.

“For you, I always have something prepared.”

 

* * *

 

After lunch on the first day, a footman takes Hannibal to a guest suite with solid core doors and heavy locks that seal from the outside. He’s allowed his personal effects, not that anyone in Mason’s employ seems eager to cross Hannibal on this matter, but there is no internet connection for his electronic devices. In fact, the room itself is curiously devoid of any technology whatsoever. No access to news, save for what Hannibal reads at breakfast, and no connections to the outside world. 

Mason coos at him during meals like he’s some exotic animal, and it would seem he’s simply traded one prison for another.

“I think I’ve waited long enough,” Mason announces one evening as he waives away a member of the wait staff. “We’ve danced around each other for years, and I’ve been hospitable to say the least.” 

Hannibal has patiently waited through three weeks of insufferable arrogance and boasting in anticipation of this moment.

“I was calling in a debt, Mason.” Hannibal reminds him.

“And yet you’re still here, with _me_.” Verger purrs lasciviously.

Hannibal pats his lips clean with a linen napkin.  He doesn’t feel the need to mention the decorative wrought iron bars that cage his windows. 

 

“I am quite sure I dislike being held against my will, Mason,” he says evenly. “I am not one of your little toys, I will not hesitate to fight back.”

Mason laughs, the sound mocking to Hannibal’s ears. Margot’s lips curl in distaste from across the room, Zeus panting beside her.

“Give me what I want, and you’re free to go,” Verger taunts, jabbing in Hannibal’s directions with the prongs of his fork. Hannibal pushes his chair away from the table, standing easily and waiting for his personal guard to get their bearings.

“Allow me to retire to my room and freshen up, so to speak, and I agree. You have waited far too long.”

Mason grins, leaning back in his seat with guileless grace. “An hour, Doctor,” he says firmly, holding up his right index finger. “One hour.”

“More than enough time.” Hannibal agrees, scratching behind Zeus’ ears before retreating to his quarters.

The knowledge that a man such as Verger has been in his presence and still lives curls sour on Hannibal’s tongue like spoiled cream, but such survival is not without a cost.

 

* * *

 

Mason smiles with all the innocence of an apex predator in a petting zoo: with too many teeth and too little supervision.

“Are you going to fuck me, Doctor? Or would you rather ‘devour’ me?”

Hannibal lets the tempered smile he’s entertained all evening drop from his lips, though Verger is far too inebriated to notice.

“I have no desire to eat you,” Hannibal explains, tightening the restraints with precise motion. “You are contaminated, diseased,” he pulls at the leather strap until he can hear bones creak over Verger’s empty moaning. “A truly disgusting human being.” 

“A bit tight, Hannibal, your technique could use a little work,” Mason groans playfully through his teeth. “But I guess that’s what you get when you bag a serial killer, not much experience with prolonged restraint. More about the fucking over than actual fucking."

Hannibal moves to the dresser, where an enamel cologne diffuser sits idly beside a shining silver cigarette case, seemingly ignorant of its own intended use as evident by the crumpled _Pall Mall_ package beside it.

“The only reason you survived me all those years ago was simply for this moment,” Hannibal says as he swings his arm wide, watching as Verger’s face contorts in confusion.

“What, exactly, are you going to do to me?” Mason asks, voice heavy with condescension.

“I am going to do what I should have done the moment we were first alone together. What I should have done in the very breath after you first explained, in such _vibrant_ detail, the indignities you forced upon the innocent in your care.” Hannibal draws a finger down the length of Verger’s restrained arm, over the bulge of toned bicep and the thickly coiled tendons flexing with every movement of Mason’s wrist.

“And you’re some saint now? Your crimes were for the ‘greater good’? Don’t forget, I know what you are, what you’ve done-” Hannibal takes the cologne and sprays the liquid over Verger’s face to silence him. 

“ _What is that_?”

Hannibal pauses in his movement to collect a small item from his pocket. A single pill, light blue in color and oblique in shape; retrieved from a safety deposit box in Lexington without much trouble at all.

“Open your mouth, Mason.”

Verger smiles lasciviously and sticks out his flattened tongue to accept Hannibal’s benediction.

“For you?” Hannibal whispers smoothly. “A marital aid. Something to add a bit of color to our coitus.”

“I can assure you, I don’t need an _‘aid’_ ,” Mason bites around the pill, fluctuating between embarrassed rage and arousal as he tries to swallow. 

“Don’t swallow, chew. It will absorb faster.”

“Party favors, Doctor? Kinky. I’ve drugged a few kids, never quite works out the way you hope, but you’re a licensed physician, I trust you’ve got your dosages down?”

Hannibal ignores Verger’s rambling and stands back; observes the manner in which Verger’s skin glistens with anticipatory perspiration in the dim candlelight.

“Very powerful, a psychedelic such as this,” Hannibal repeats, trailing his nails lightly over the tight ridges of Verger’s abdomen, soundly refusing to acknowledge the man’s straining genitalia only inches away. “I have to be sure you can handle yourself before we go any further.”

Verger grins lazily, toothy and pleased.

“You going to wreck me, Doctor Lecter? Raise the stakes in our little game?”

“Something like that.” Hannibal returns the gesture and plucks a box of matches from the bedside table.

Mason gives him a playful look, batting his lashes and using all the charm his wealth and good breeding have afforded him.

“Please don’t hurt me, Mister,” Verger whines, thrusting his hips up in a manner he must think is alluring, sweat gathering at his closely trimmed pubic hair. “I can pay you, I have money.”

Hannibal stands over Verger, grimaces at the sight of his wet skin, his dark arousal and sees only the sickness of his existence. 

Bad meat.

“You have money, Mason,” he retorts, and lights a match to hold against one of the nearby candles. “But I have taste. How do you feel?”

“Buzzed. High. I don’t know, what did you give me?” 

"Do you feel handsome? Desired?"

Mason grins, the expression loose and muscles pliant.

"With you? Always. I won, you couldn't resist me in the end. My money, my body, my, my," Mason trails off, smacking his lips curiously; like a child newly woken from a dentist's chair. "I win." He laughs. "I _always_ win."

"Not quite, dear Mason," Hannibal tuts, sliding a hand across Verger's slick abdomen; the taut muscles beneath twitching at the foreign contact. "You have no claim to me. I am not a child you can taint with your sickness."

"Claim? I own you, Lecter. _Hannibal._ One little phone call, fuck, one little _word_ and you're done. That's it."

"And as to your own indiscretions?” Hannibal asks, curious as to the answer.”

"Who's gonna believe a cannibal?” Mason laughs. “No one.”

"So it would seem." he agrees.

"Enough talk," Mason demands, bucking against Hannibal’s touch. "Let's get to the sex."

"Are you really so interested in intercourse at this moment? I thought we were making progress."

"What, is this a therapy session now? As I seem to recall, you don't fuck patients."

"I do not sexually engage child molesters, either. I have several rules."

"Oh, that's right, your mystery ethics." Mason giggles, a sound Hannibal is quite certain he finds unappetizing. "I seem to remember your pretty little exception, Graham? Not so pretty anymore."

Hannibal digs his nails hard into the meat of Verger's hip at the mention of Will, causing the man to hiss and recoil as Hannibal begins to draw blood.

"Fine, fine! Your fucked up little boyfriend is off limits. I just assumed you had better taste," Mason bites, slurring slightly on the vowels. "Didn't know you had a thing for the deformed."

"Deformed?" Hannibal asks before he can stop himself, and Verger only looks confused.

"Is that what you like? Ugly people?" Mason breathes, as if Hannibal has said something revelatory. Given what the man has recently ingested, this may not be far from the truth.

"No," Hannibal corrects. "I like honest people. What did you mean Will Graham was ‘deformed’?”

"I'm honest." Mason says softly, as if aware of his own half-truth, ignoring Hannibal’s question.

“Mason. What did you mean?”

“I’m honest.” he says again, and Hannibal knows he will not pull the answer he wants from Verger now that he’s lost to his own mind. Instead Hannibal pushes on with Mason’s declaration of honesty.

"Are you, Mason? Because I can see lies written all across your face."

Verger blinks owlishly up at Hannibal.

"My face?"

"Your face. Perhaps something can be done about that."

"Really? Tell me."

Hannibal undoes the restraints around Verger's wrists, and the man reaches up to touch his cheeks lightly, prodding at the blemish-free skin with curiosity.

"You wear a very convincing mask, Mason, made of weak flesh and your father’s lies." Hannibal tells him. "Take off your false skin and perhaps I will care for the man beneath."

It’s a stretch, and Hannibal realizes this even as the suggestion leaves his lips. He was not even-handed with his development of this particular drug, and he’s speculative as to the true extent of its uses as a debilitating psychotropic. However, Hannibal has waited a long time to see Mason Verger come undone, and he’s willing to get a little creative.

Mason had always been open to suggestion, as to how far he might take such prompting, well, Hannibal has always been very persuasive.

"Of course," Mason whispers, and pleasure swells within Hannibal like an ebbing tide as Verger draws his nails hard across his stubbled skin. "But how?"

If Hannibal possessed a blade on his person, he would hand it over gladly.

"I am afraid I cannot help you with such a task, Mason. However, you might employ the use of something sharp? If only you had allowed me the possession of a knife," Hannibal feigns regret and glances around the room.

"Wait."

Verger looks at him desperately, skin mottled pink and red from where he continues to claw at his face 

"What? What is it, what can we use?"

Hannibal catches his reflection through the ajar closet door.

"You can use glass, my dear Mason. That should be sharp enough."

Verger scrambles across the bedspread, reeking of cologne and hands trailing spots of red over the light fabric. Hannibal takes a step back to admire the man's desperation and a smile pulls at his lips when he hears the cool, brittle splinter of shattering glass.

"Hannibal," he hears, the name slightly muffled for reasons he can only imagine. "You're right, it's not _my_ face, it never was."

Hannibal takes small, measured steps to the oversized walk-in. Partly to savor the sight he anticipates waits to greet him; partly to let Mason do as much damage to himself as humanly possible. In his experience, it's always best not to rush these things.

The sight that greets him is beautifully grotesque: Mason with a makeshift blade in one hand and a handful of dripping skin in the other, his body twitching with burgeoning shock and face a bloody maw of exposed muscle and cartilage.

 _"What now?"_ Verger gasps, words slurred and bleeding out from behind non-existent lips. He holds up the hand with the skin and sees, buried in the mess, an eye - a cool blue iris just visible amid bloody white sclera - held out like an offering.

"Not for me, Mason. Your flesh is tainted, fit for no man's consumption. Least of all mine. You need to cast away your shame."

Hannibal catches the _skritch-skritch_ of canine curiosity on the opposite side of the locked bedroom door. Zeus. It's very likely the scent of fresh meat has lured him, like a shark in open water.

"I am quite sure your pets would appreciate such a gesture, as I myself cannot."

Verger attempts to smile, bone white teeth snarling and grotesquely macabre.

 _"Of course,"_ he rasps, and Hannibal watches the butchered muscles in his cheeks twinge limply at whatever expression Verger is attempting to make. _"I can't whistle."_

Hannibal would laugh, but he's too entertained to wish to distract Mason from his own undoing.

"I will fetch your dear animal."

Hannibal strides quickly to the door, slides the lock open and ushers in the large beast. Zeus beats a path to Mason, tail waving with excitement, and Hannibal watches with undisguised delight as Mason feeds his own flesh to his dog.

When Zeus is licking the blood from Mason’s hands, Hannibal tugs the beast away and ushers it out the door once more.

 _“I wasn’t done.”_ Mason bemoans, words barely coherent.

“Yes, you were.”

Hannibal drags Mason bodily back into the main room, heedless of the mess, and returns to the closet. He raids the unlocked safe tucked behind a rack of largely untouched Zegna suits while Verger's moans of discomfort slowly turn to cries of anguish as he regains the feeling in his face.

When the cries are distracting enough, Hannibal calls out, "You have to cauterize the wounds, Mason,"  while sorting through a stack of high-denomination bearer bonds. "Unfortunately that is the only way to stop the pain."

Tucked behind the bonds are small steel boxes full to bursting with photographs of subjects that curl distastefully in Hannibal's stomach. Some of small, naked children, others of expressionless corpses, though there are far fewer of the latter.

Mason begins screaming, high-pitched and panicked, and Hannibal can smell the sickly sweet scent of burning fat.

"Oh, how terrible," Hannibal laments under his breath. "Mason, dear, something must have caught fire."

Hannibal takes the bonds. He takes the thick stack of hundred dollar bills as well as the European Union banknotes. He takes the information regarding several of Mason's likely undocumented overseas accounts.

He leaves the handful of gold coins and obviously trophy jewelry. He has little time for the barter system.

Mason is writhing on the floor when Hannibal emerges, and above him, holding a singed blanket and an expression of shock is Margot; appearing as surprised by her actions as Hannibal is.

“You do realize I afforded you a golden opportunity to rid yourself of the vermin you call your brother.”

She looks conflicted.

“I need him.”

“No,” Hannibal says, and leans down to grab a thick sliver of mirror still coated in Mason’s blood. He wraps the shard in a scrap of fabric and makes several precise cuts under Margot’s watchful eye. He wraps the flesh in a silk pocket-square and gives Margot Verger exactly what she’s waited her entire life to take from her brother.

“You need _these_. Not him. I recommend icing them immediately if you wish to preserve any viable  reproductive material.”

Hannibal steps around Verger's charred, twitching body as he leaves; tossing the most explicit pictures across the bedspread for good measure.  

“Do let him die this time, would you?” Hannibal turns to leave, but stops, remembering a question from earlier.

“Margot?”

She looks up, still visibly conflicted as to her next course of action.

“Where, exactly, will I find the kennel?”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> onawingandaswear.tumblr.com


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He doesn’t know what he is expecting, but the state of one’s home is always a good indicator of their mental health, and Will’s home reeks of chronic illness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this has been months in the waiting, and I am terribly sorry for the delay.

 

 

“Is there something you need?” Margot asks him tentatively. A curious tone that belies the spatial imposition of her physical size. 

“No, my dear, I believe I possess everything I require.”

“Did you find the money?”

“I did indeed. I left your mother’s jewelry untouched; there is a certain ring, white gold with the three carat emerald cut?” Margot flushes behind a firm scowl and Hannibal takes her hand in his own, now clean of Mason’s blood and seminal fluid.

“It would look stunning on your beloved’s ring finger, don’t you think?”

“Dr. Lecter,”

“My only regret is that I did not act more quickly on this matter. Go home. Claim ignorance.” Margot is irritated by the command, but huffs in agreement. “I am the fugitive, and I will take credit where credit is due.” Hannibal continues, placing his arguably ill-gotten gains into a fine-grain Italian leather duffel; another souvenir from Mason’s overly elaborate closet.

“There’s a silver Chevy, an SUV, in the staff garage. Keys are inside, and there shouldn’t be any lingering issues about the title or insurance,” Margot tells him as he looks down to slide the zipper shut. “One of Mason’s ‘off the book’ vehicles. Visible, but not conspicuous. Though I think if you were going to be stopped, the concern wouldn’t be the car.”

“No, my dear, I should think not.” Hannibal tells her, rising to his feet and swinging the pack over his shoulder. A frown pulls at his lips when the action causes him to stumble slightly, offset by the weight of the pack. Margot doesn’t move to steady him. He’s not offended. Extended Imprisonment has done him no kindness.

“What if he’s not dead.” Margot says bluntly, not really asking a question. Hannibal looks at her; examining her stern features and cool gaze, expressions born of horrific necessity.

“Then you are a much kinder soul than I.” Hannibal says easily, shifting the weight on his back.

“He’s my brother.” Margot breathes, looking away and scratching determinedly at a spot on her arm. “I want him to suffer.”

“If he survives, his existence will be far from a pleasant one. If he dies, the world is rid of him for good. _You_ are rid of him for good.” 

Margot bites her lip.

“How bad a person does it make me that I want him to live so I can kill him myself?”

“I am quite certain any opinion I have on this matter will be quite skewed.” Hannibal moves to the hallway, but he can hear Margot’s heavy footfalls behind him. “Do what you will with Mason.” He says bluntly, casting an glance over his shoulder at the now silent woman. "I believe I have already made my position quite clear regarding your brother.”

He takes his leave, appreciating the artwork and sophisticated architectural choices that have made Verger’s manor house so visually appealing. He does not, however, attribute any of this beauty to Mason himself. 

Hannibal passes Zeus in the foyer, the dog is alert, wagging his massive tail in greeting as Hannibal leaves. Perhaps if he had the time, the _energy_ to train an animal, he would want something as large as Zeus. A creature with the temperament and size to take down a grown man should the situation arise. Hannibal mentally files away the breed for future reference. Perhaps in another life. One twice removed from the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Ten Most Wanted.

A security guard nods to him as he heads to the correct garage, and Hannibal wonders how strong a hold Margot truly had over Mason, despite the man’s insistence to the contrary. 

Hannibal hopes Mason has succumbed. Not because he doesn’t wish the man to suffer infinitely, but more so that he is a great fan of synchronicity; the ouroboros coming back to itself. 

Something metal jangles irritatingly from within his bag and a European Starling echoes a wavering whistle of a sound in return. If he concentrates, he can still feel the ghost of Mason’s blood gumming thick on his skin.

Disgusting.

The staff garage is an old outhouse of a building beneath an expensive veneer, protecting Verger’s wealth from those forced to admire it. Card tables and a makeshift break room consume a fifth of the garage, the cars parked haphazardly to leave as much room as possible for the staff. Hannibal is alone in the darkness of the pre-dawn hours, and he is unashamed to admit he enjoys the momentary silence. 

A Chevrolet Tahoe, likely several years removed from the current model of manufacture, sits dull and dirt spotted among the other worn vehicles of Verger’s likely underpaid house staff. He doesn’t give much thought to the vehicle’s intended purpose as he searches through the glove box, and then the center console, for the keys. 

Irritation grips him when he flips down the sun visor and the keys fall into his lap as if to say, _we were here the whole time._ The man reflected back at Hannibal in the small vanity mirror is tired and worn. Thin and greying.  Skin sallow and expression properly irritated.

He allows himself a brief moment to mourn the comforts of his previous life. His nineteenth century Baltimore manor house. His Bentley. His unspeakably beautiful kitchen. The accouterments of a life well earned, heedless of past failures and built on a foundation of blood and bone.

He will not lie to himself and claim he no longer desires the comforts wealth had afforded him.

The security gate opens to the main road, and Hannibal dutifully pulls wide as he’s passed by a bevy of emergency vehicles heading in the opposite direction.

When Hannibal has covered sufficient ground, he parks outside of a Starbucks and piggybacks the wifi connection on a tablet borrowed from Mason’s home office. The security functions on the device are superb, and it would have been a shame to leave such a beneficial piece of technology to go to waste.

Hannibal does not need to engage in an extensive search to locate Will’s place of residence, he is, after all, the man that alerted Francis Dolarhyde to Will’s location. While it is likely the man has uprooted in the months since his encounter with Dolarhyde, the fact remains that Will’s survival would not be without some measure of physical damage. 

Two men, corroborating the same vague information, make unwieldy sources at best, but if Hannibal is anything, he is patient. When he finally arrives in Sugarloaf Key, he waits; assessing the local population and determining just how exposed he may truly be. When he’s determined he can move uninhibited, he begins planning a proper homecoming. After all, it has been so long since he’s had the opportunity to operate freely in a kitchen.

 

* * *

 

Hannibal drives for hours; night surrendering to a pre-dawn glow before blooming fully into the glaring, hazy sunlight of the humid coastal South. It is a small mercy he finds a pair of sunglasses in the glovebox next to a Glock 29 SF and a bottle of prescription drugs disguised as children’s vitamins. 

Hannibal uses the still-fresh memory of Mason’s blackened flesh and mutilated face to chase away the mental images that have always accompanied the implications of Verger’s proclivities and turns back to the road. He leaves the radio off, turns up the air conditioning and plans what comes next with the careful ease of a man in far less dire circumstances.

Unfortunately he will have very little time to establish himself before someone in Verger’s employ reveals that the man had given asylum to Hannibal Lecter for several weeks, and the manhunt will begin all over again. Dear Jack, no doubt, leading from behind to restore his shattered reputation. 

After several hours of endless asphalt and artificial climate control, he grows curious enough to fiddle with the radio. Unsurprisingly the vehicle has some sort of satellite function with access to several news networks, and Hannibal cycles through the the channels for nearly three hours, searching for any mention of his name or extended stint as a free man. No such reports come, and he cannot distinguish if he is relieved or insulted when there is no mention of his name when late news breaks of an ‘incident’ involving emergency services being dispatched to the estate of a Virginian patrician.

Hannibal adjusts the volume, just high enough that he’ll be able to catch any mention of his name, but low enough that the constant reporting will not distract him from his own thoughts.

He pointedly refuses to consider what all of this will mean if he’s captured again before reaching Florida. 

 

* * *

  

Three states and sixteen hours later, Hannibal leaves an outdoor market in Jacksonville with two ‘eco-friendly’ recycled grocery bags full to bursting with fresh produce as well as a three-pound cobia fillet on ice. 

The shopping experience in itself had been quite rewarding, with none of the locals batting an eye at his disheveled appearance, nor sounding an alarm in recognition of an escaped felon. 

It no doubt helps matters some that Hannibal is no longer the man he once may have been; the bristly overgrowth of his greying facial hair and his lean disposition acting to obscure the mental image most Americans must now have of him. 

He drives the Overseas Highway that links islands of the lower Florida Keys on cruise control, two miles above the speed limit, ignoring the slow thrum of anticipation that pulses within him after every mile marker he passes. 

The beauty of the Florida coast is dampened somewhat by the miles of sun-bleached concrete that separate him from Will.

Hannibal turns his gaze from the road, glancing down to briefly catch sight of the sandals that now grace his feet, seeming only to serve as a means by which to view his own pale skin.

He’s always been good at hiding in plain sight; adapting to what was required of him in his youth, during his residency, and most recently adapting to what was expected of him after his incarceration. 

He will simply consider what comes next as a costume change before the final act.

 

* * *

 

Will’s house, tucked away off a private road in Upper Sugarloaf Key, is quaint in the way most seaside properties aim to be, compact and intimate. Hannibal drives the length of the private road, circling the property before doubling back and parking the vehicle in a thicket of underbrush. The car will not be visible from the main road, and will not arouse any suspicion when Will invariably arrives home. 

He removes the bags from the passenger seat and leaves the keys in the ignition.

A porch swing creaks idly in the sea breeze, chains stiff with disuse as Hannibal sets the groceries on the porch against the wall. There are no visible lights. The open-air garage, where Hannibal knows Will’s multi-purpose Subaru should reside, is empty. He doesn’t need to palm the handle to know the door is locked.

He braces his foot against the jam and brings his shoulder hard against the peeling wood of the frame. The lock gives and the door swings wide on its hinges; quickly enough that Hannibal barely has the opportunity to stop it from cracking into whatever matter lies beyond. 

Fingers tingling from their tight grip on the splintering wood, Hannibal breathes deeply the scent of humidity-borne mildew and the stale sour pinch of an ill-functioning dishwasher. Pet dander and chemical cleaner. Not the scents of a home well kept, but nor are they smells the average man would find himself confronted with on a daily basis.

The single glaring commission, however, seems to be Will’s heady, chemically tainted musk. Perhaps he had taken Hannibal’s advice after all and done away with the bargain bin care products. 

Though even as the thought comes to mind, he knows it is unlikely that Will would do such a thing; in fact, it is much more likely that Will would continue to use the product simply to spite him. Like hanging garlic to deter a vampire.

The notion is quaint and brings a smile to his lips, but the moment passes quickly when he realizes he, indeed, neglected to purchase any garlic. He retrieves the bags and sets them gently on the counter before closing the door slowly, caution overriding informed intellect that the home is currently unoccupied, and trails a hand lightly across the faux stone countertop. He inspects his fingers in the dusky light. Dust. The grit of sand and a hint of grease. There is a single potato in a fruit bowl, flesh green with arsenic. 

He doesn’t know what he is expecting, but the state of one’s home is always a good indicator of their mental health, and Will’s home _reeks_ of chronic illness.

A soft, metallic _clink_ of metal identification tags heralds the arrival of a small canine of unidentifiable breed, wagging its tail in delight at Hannibal’s presence. 

He’d almost forgotten Will’s obsession with animals. 

He crouches slowly, a hand extended - palm down to convey submission - and the small creature approaches, tongue lolling. Hannibal scratches behind the dog’s ears before reaching for the plain collar. The animal is female, but the name is barely legible on the worn metal; the address is incorrect. Given this fact, he has no doubt she is Will’s.

“I suppose you are to be my sous chef?” Hannibal asks, and she nudges his hand in response before blitzing around the corner and out of sight. Hannibal balances on his toes and rests his hands on his thighs, waiting for the animal to return; and after a moment she does, tail whipping back and forth, an orange, oblong plastic toy clenched firmly in her mouth.

“I fear you are a terrible guard dog, my dear.”

Hannibal takes the toy and palms it firmly in his hand, beckoning the dog to follow him and using the sound of her jingling collar to mask his footsteps. He does not yet know if Will occupies this property alone, and he deeply desires that this night go well for all parties involved.

The dim kitchen transitions into a rather warmly appointed hallway, and Hannibal pauses before reaching the doorway to what must be an office or bedroom. Hannibal catches the low, rhythmic thrum of an oscillating fan.

He motions with his hand absently and the dog snuffles excitedly, looking between Hannibal and the toy as he pushes open the door to the office. He waves a hand, shying the dog away from him, eventually giving up and tossing the orange bone back toward the kitchen. 

The room is not an office, though Will’s old fly-tying desk is the first thing that greets him when he opens the door fully. There is a bed pressed flush against the far wall, a closet, its door ajar, displays seasonally inappropriate clothing that would be better suited for a more northern climate and an attached bathroom. The room is well lived-in, warmly furnished, but reeks of stale sweat, antiseptic and no small amount of liquor. The smells do little to arouse his desires for Will.

He passes a bathroom and glances inward. The scene offered to him is that of a seemingly overwhelming number of pill bottles precariously shoved between the sink and the wall. He can make out the names of at least two opiate based painkillers, an anti-inflammatory and an anti-psychotic with an unbroken seal. The only bottle showing signs of conscientious objection, it would seem, to whatever psychological diagnosis had accompanied the physical ones. Off to the side, and nearly empty, is a probiotic almost two weeks out of date. 

He takes the anti-psychotic, slipping the bottle easily into the front pocket of his jeans, and resists the urge to swap the unwanted medication with another perscription Will has actually been imbibing regularly.

Hannibal checks his watch - a rose gold Vacheron Constantin timepiece Mason had been so _generous_ to lend him - and quickly estimates how long it will take him to prepare dinner and if that time will even be enough to head off Will’s return; as the drive to the nearest town with a significant retail presence took Hannibal nearly forty-five minutes to arrive from. It is reasonable to believe that it will take at least that long for Will to return, it is more likely, though, that he will take much longer to return. 

Hannibal should have more than enough time to throw something together; perhaps if only in spite of Will’s ill-stocked kitchen.

 

* * *

 

Hannibal opts for the sparing use of olive oil as a replacement for butter. He deigns to keep the dish light, airy, as Will likely will not indulge in much of it; he won’t insult Will by cooking anything that could be interpreted as his more infamous fare, and this is an evening long in the making, one that will likely require a fair amount of apology, voiced in careful word and action.

A very vocal part of Hannibal wants to make their reunion into a show. Wants to roast some deserving soul on a spit and revel in their idiosyncratic suffering as an offering to Will’s no longer fragile mind. Rationality reminds him there is no time, and if he wants the evening to be executed properly, concessions must be made.

The dog snuffles around Hannibal’s feet as he debones the fish, looking for scraps. It’s a mild irritation, and briefly Hannibal longs for the behaviorally sound animals Will had once owned; but the creature is harming nothing and likely new to Will’s household.

Hannibal slices a small piece from the cobia and whistles, drawing her attention up, before dropping the meat to the floor. She catches the treat in midair, swallowing likely before even being able to taste the fish, and Hannibal returns to his task, pausing only to pre-heat the oven and trim the slight wilt from the green onions.

When Hannibal comes back to his own thoughts, Will’s dog has resigned itself to the corner where she watches him with a sort of bored curiosity.

“Perhaps you are more well-trained than I gave you credit for.” Hannibal says aloud. 

The dog just blinks at him in response.

While the dish bakes, Hannibal scrubs down the dining room table, retrieving the place settings and dishes he had purchased from a small cooking store of high regard back in Charlotte from a saleswoman who regarded his less-than appearance with some measure of disdain. Hannibal will not deny that for a brief moment he had envisioned impaling her on the sterling silver kabob set she had been reluctant to show him, but his irritation and her critical eye disappeared shortly after he offered to pay with cash.

The dull thrum of an engine rolls into Hannibal’s awareness at roughly the same time he’s finishing the tarragon infused beurre blanc for the cobia. He fights the anticipation that laps at the corners of his awareness, adrenaline making his chest tight and vision sharp as he spoons the sauce delicately over the tender fish. The dog whines pitifully as the engine cuts, and Hannibal can hear footsteps displacing sand and gravel with equal measure. 

He offers a glance to the dining room table, immaculate and generously appointed for two guests, wipes his hands with a dishtowel and moves to open the bottle of Pinot d’Alsace he had selected to accompany the dish some two-hundred miles ago.

Hannibal hears the door open slowly, carefully, and give his obstructed position he can only assume Will must be acting with some measure of caution, likely given the number of lights Hannibal has turned on for atmospheric purposes.

“I hope you don’t mind,” Hannibal announces with faux brevity. “I am afraid I have made myself quite at home.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> onawingandaswear.tumblr.com


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Go ahead,” Will wheezes, his lips shining red with blood and saliva from where he’s bitten his lip. “I’m tired of waiting for you, for your drones, for every two-bit psychopath that thinks I’m some goddamn horse whisperer for the deranged-”
> 
> Will trails off as Hannibal relaxes his grip and lets his fingers hover over the lines of developing scar tissue that bloom across Will’s face like the tendrils of a noxious weed. Thin streaks of shining skin that have healed tight; pulling the healthy dermis taught and exposing slivers of coffee-stained canine where Will is unable to fully close his lips. 
> 
> It is a picture of defeat, carved into weak flesh by an artist undeserving of such a masterpiece.

 

**//Audio Recording Edited for Content (Federal Authorization: 70392 - Crawford, Jack; 6/19/2018)//**

 

***Recording Start***

**LECTER** : “Jack. It’s been so long since we’ve had a nice chat-”

 **CRAWFORD** : “Put Will on the phone.”

 **LECTER** : “…I am quite afraid that Will won’t be doing much speaking in the near future. He was not as cooperative as I had hoped he would be. Certain measures had to be taken.”

 **CRAWFORD** : _“What have you done?”_

 **LECTER** : “Do you remember that evening several years ago where you and your lovely wife joined me for dinner, and we indulged in a _superb_ veal cutlet? Well, it has come to my attention that the creature was not euthanized as humanely as I was led to believe, but I am planning on employing a more reliable butcher and attempting the dish again.”

 **CRAWFORD** : _“What have you done with Graham?”_

 **LECTER** : “Now, Jack, I am graciously offering to supply the meal for our little reunion, and all you can think about is poor Will. I have about sixteen hours before I make the state line, so, shall we say seven tomorrow evening for dinner?”

 **CRAWFORD** : _“What have you done to Graham?”_

 **LECTER** : “Your persistence is quite unnecessary. Dear Will is going to be our guest of honor. In fact, he’s so angry I ruined the surprise I had to leave him to, how should I put this, ‘stew in his own juices’ for a short while. Don’t worry, I’m sure he’ll have softened up quite nicely by the time we meet.” 

 **CRAWFORD** : “ _I’ll-_ “

 **LECTER** : “Seven, Jack. If your dear wife is still breathing, she’s welcome to attend.”

***End Recording***

 

* * *

 

It is a curious surprise that Will moves toward him, rather than away, as Hannibal has anticipated to have to run the man down; envisioning a feckless chase through the brush, culminating in a reluctant, if anticipated, reunion. Today, however, Hannibal knows the other man will be emotionally compromised; just as Hannibal is anticipatory, flush with excitement and no small amount of pleasure at the circumstances that have brought him to this point.

Maybe it’s just the progression of time or simply the fact that Hannibal has slowly been deteriorating all these years, but the pleasure of watching Will come into his field of vision has become significant in ways Hannibal would have previously disregarded as fallacies of irrational thought. Perhaps this is the reason Hannibal neglects to respond appropriately when Will lunges across the small space and connects his fist with Hannibal’s cheek.

The act does little to daze him beyond the initial surprise that follows the sharp, biting pain in his cheek. When Hannibal has straightened, he finds Will standing before him, evidently making no move to do any more than he has already.

The facial distortion he had previously believed to be due to the bungalow’s poor lighting is something else entirely; and the truth behind Mason’s vague commentary on Will’s appearance becomes clear. The man’s once pleasingly symmetrical features are lopsided: to the left, Will is as Hannibal remembers. To the right, the man’s face is a mess of sun-bleached scar tissue and damaged muscle.

Anger tears through Hannibal, his blood burning hot with jealousy and no small amount of envy. The wound is a betrayal of everything they are, everything they are meant to have. The scarring is beautiful and hideous and none of it is _his_. The scar that must be on Will’s abdomen, that is Hannibal’s mark, a sign of ownership; but _this_ , this is lasting, masterful and disgusting and _it isn’t his._

“You let him touch you?” Hannibal demands, too furious to make the words come out as more than a hoarse demand. “You let him mark you?”

Will blinks in momentary confusion, but his expression turns dark when he realizes to what Hannibal is referring.

“You seem surprised.” Will motions to his face as if there is nothing particularly interesting about his disfigurement. “Don’t you like it? I understand you had something to do with it.”

Hannibal cannot take his eyes away from the ropey white flesh that winds across Will's cheek like long dead ivy. He doesn’t respond to Will's question. He can't. Much to his own chagrin, words have failed him. He wants to touch, to bite, to rend flesh from bone, but he’s here, lost in his own mind, writhing beneath Will’s heel like an insect. 

“I wondered if you’d ever try to contact me. After everything you did.”

Will pinches the bridge of his nose hard, rubbing at a line of pale pink scar tissue with the pad of his thumb as he pauses to take a breath - body tense like the action pains him - and his fingers move south to ghost over the scarring on his lips.

“You told him to kill my family. To kill me. You remember, don’t you? What was done on your order?”

“Did he succeed?” Hannibal asks finally, adjust his posture in an attempt to regain some semblance of normalcy. “Did Dolarhyde actually kill you? Or dear Molly?”

Will smile is tight; whether that is a byproduct of the sub-dermal tissue damage or the man's emotional state, Hannibal cannot say. 

“You called me your friend, and then you attempted to eviscerate me. You claimed to love me, and you sent a psychopath to slaughter my family-” Hannibal laughs at the wording, though Will chooses to ignore him, continuing on with growing fervor. “The relative successes and failures of those events hinged on little besides circumstance, which you knew; but your intent,” Will's expression turns sour as he motions again to his mutilated cheek. “Your _intent_ has made all of this a much more _visceral_ experience for me.”

“I never wanted you dead,” Hannibal rebuts, forcing himself not to think of Dolarhyde. “Only incapacitated. Malleable. Though you know all of this, so why question me now, when there are so many other things we could be discussing.”

“You’re the psychiatrist, Dr. Lecter. Tell me, if you were in my position, confronted with a man who had torn your world from you, had destroyed everything you loved and ruined your chances to ever be seen as normal, even human, again, what would you do? Would you listen while he explains how everything he did was for your own good? I can only assume that’s why you’re here now,” Will looks over Hannibal’s shoulder at the place settings on the dining room table. “Cooking me dinner and not impaling me on a spit.”

Will taps his fingers rhythmically on the countertop; a nervous one-two pattern Hannibal recognizes from their long-dismissed therapy sessions and Will’s time with Chilton.

“You ruined me: physically, emotionally, _mentally_ ,” Will sucks in a rough breath on ‘mentally’ like speaking the word hurts him physically. Hallie, who up until this point has been out of Hannibal’s line of sight, is confused by the sound and rushes past Hannibal to the kitchen door, her tail shedding wiry hairs on his pant leg. 

“Please, tell me. What would you do?” Will asks, face angry but eyes pleading for an honest answer.

“Are you expecting some kind of absolution? I will tell you what I _did_ in your position,” Hannibal responds, keeping his eyes locked with Will’s own. “However, what has, regretfully, been taken from you is arguably quite insubstantial compared to what was taken from myself.” The statement does nothing to placate Will, his expression twisting distastefully, and the tapping continues.

“I would assume it was terrible, given the monster you’ve proved to be.” Will bites, teeth bared momentarily, and the action reminds Hannibal of a feral animal before taking no small amount of offense at Will's dismissal. His displeasure must show in his face, because Will, for a brief moment, is taken aback; cowed into silence.

“I lost a great deal more than you may ever truly comprehend, should I ever deign to share that tale with you in its entirety. Now, make no mistake, just because I did not personally skin and devour those precious to you does not mean I am incapable of such a task. I am human, I have morals and restraint.”

“So your argument is not that you are a monster, but that you are a psychopath? You sound like Chilton. What makes you better than them, Hannibal? What, exactly, makes you more human than those that obviously did this to you?”

Hannibal knows what he is, what he has done, and if Will is expecting him to break, to collapse into a mess of repressed memory and emotion, he will be sorely disappointed.

“By the standards of many, nothing. I have no illusions as to who I am or what I have become. My nature is my own, and despite your arguments to the contrary I am the only living individual that will ever come close to comprehending your Alighieri-esq labyrinth of a mind.” Hannibal rolls his shoulders and inhales, allowing his chest to expand in a subtle expression of dominance despite his restrained position. “I have killed a great many people for you, Will; but truly, do you know how many? How much of that blood should rightfully be on your hands?” 

Will’s eyes have gone dark; his nostrils flared and his twisted lips pulled into a frown. If Hannibal didn’t know better, he’d say the man was angry.

“So, before we go pointing fingers and demanding proof of humanity,” Hannibal continues. “Tell me, Will Graham, what, exactly, makes _you_ human? Is it your dissociative personality? Your ability to mentally empathize with the most sadistic, arguably inhuman, individuals imaginable? Or is it that the only significant emotional attraction you have ever felt is to the man that showed you the color of your own intestines?”

Will lunges forward, his hands gripping tight around Hannibal’s neck; thumbs cutting off oxygen and blurring his vision as Will brings his marred face in close. 

“Is this what you’ve wanted from me all along?” Will seethes, teeth bared, snarling like one of his precious dogs. “I’m ‘sane’ now, Doctor; no one would believe this was anything but self-defense; _because you’re a monster._ ” Will’s hands are tight around his neck, and with his vision sparking Hannibal closes his eyes and shifts his weight.

 _I am a monster_ , Hannibal agrees, even if there is no air left to speak such a damning admission. 

Together they fall backward, crashing to the floor in a clutter of limbs and enmity. Before Will can recover, Hannibal is upon him, pinning the man to the floor with a strength he has no right to possess given his years of captivity.

“Go ahead,” Will wheezes, his pursed lips shining red with blood and saliva from where he’s bitten his lip. “I’m tired of waiting for you, for your drones, for every two-bit psychopath that thinks I’m some goddamn horse whisperer for the deranged-”

Will trails off as Hannibal relaxes his grip and lets his fingers hover over the lines of developing scar tissue that bloom across Will’s face like the tendrils of a noxious weed. Thin streaks of shining skin that have healed tight; pulling the healthy dermis taught and exposing slivers of coffee-stained canine where Will is unable to fully close his lips. 

It is a picture of defeat, carved into weak flesh by an artist undeserving of such a masterpiece.

“The last vestiges of a broken man,” Hannibal says, letting a measure of regret seep into the words. Will doesn’t dignify his appearance with a response, he just holds Hannibal’s gaze with cold defiance.

Hannibal draws his thumb gently over the worst of the scarring: a half-inch thick gouge to the left of Will’s lips that twists the skin of his cheek with all the grace of a snared thread on a loose-knit linen shirt. Will’s eyes flutter shut briefly, almost flinching. Whether this is a response to the contact itself or at the lingering threat behind it, Hannibal cannot know.

“I trusted you to take care of yourself,” Hannibal says, caressing Will’s undamaged lower lip with a careful thumb. “Imagine my surprise at finding you like this. So jaded, so easily roused to anger. I was mistaken in thinking you had gleaned any knowledge from our time together.”

Will grimaces and jerks away from Hannibal’s touch, throwing out a hand to brace himself against the cabinet, but Hannibal does not lose his hold on Will’s body.

“You sent Dolarhyde after me,” Will argues, cheek muscles twitching as he speaks through clenched teeth. “What possible reason could you have to justify anythingyou’ve done to me?”

Hannibal observes Will. He takes in the man’s scarred face, the lingering breathy rot of newfound alcohol abuse and the emotional depression that must come with simply existing as _Will Graham_. Hannibal does not feel shame. Or remorse. This was Will’s failure, not his own, and he will not be made privy to the unnecessary details of a half-life that does not concern him, no matter how badly he desires to claim the opposite.

“I sent Dolarhyde after you because I believed you capable of stopping a man who intended to kill us both. I did not realize you would be so compromised as to let him get the drop on you.”

Hannibal lets his thumb linger on the corner of Will’s mouth, even as the man sputters with disbelief. 

“Are you trying to tell me that was some kind of _gift_?” The ‘g’ comes out much harder than it should, and Will swallows reflexively after speaking, clearly negatively self-aware of the impediment. “God, you’ve taken everything from me,” Will admits, voice cracking. “I’m so tired of waiting for you.” Cringing, he drops his head hard against the wood floor.

The Will Graham before him now, the man he has so adored for so long, the man asking for _death_ , is not the man Hannibal remembers. Will’s surrender is infuriatingly pathetic; Hannibal does not hesitate from telling him as much, firmly gripping Will’s jaw between his fingers.

“Is this what has become of you?” Hannibal taunts, watching as Will’s skin goes pale white beneath the pressure of his grip. “Begging for death? Do you know what I have done? How many people I have killed? You have no comprehension of what I am, of my legacy. Yet you survived me, and such was my mistake to view you as anything more than diseased meat. I should have let you die, let the infection in your brain drive you to madness before stopping your heart myself.”  

A red flush creeps from Will’s neck to his brow-bone, bypassing the pale skin compressed by Hannibal’s undoubtedly painful grasp. 

“I lied to you, Will, I bought your trust with the paltry promises of friendship and I used the fibers of your gullibility to destroy everything about you: your career, your personal life, in the end, even your body. I had truly hoped you would rise valiantly from the ashes of your blistering weakness, as emboldened a man as I knew you capable of becoming; yet here you lie before me, feeble as a child and stinking of cheap liquor.”

The words are meant to bite, to rouse Will to action, if nothing else.

“How much did you really think you could do before you broke me,” Will breathes, shaking off Hannibal’s hand roughly. There is a waning hint of challenge in Will’s tone that tamps down a bit of the anguish burning in Hannibal’s chest. 

“Will, I am growing quite tired of your admissions of defeat.”

Somehow, watching the fight leave Will makes Hannibal incredibly weary; like witnessing a fire smoldering into ashy nothingness. It’s disappointing, having played this game for so long, only for his careful work to culminate into the broken thing that lies before him. Hannibal cannot, however, convince himself he is not ultimately to blame. You cannot break a bird’s wings and be forlorn when the creature dies. He leans back, resting his weight briefly on Will’s abdomen, over the scar Hannibal knows rests beneath the thin fabric of Will’s shirt, before rising to his feet. Will remains on the ground, surprised by the act and unsure of how to proceed. Hannibal holds out a hand, waiting for Will to accept his offer of assistance.

“What is this?” Will asks him, eyeing him warily. “What the hell are you doing?”

“I am not letting the meal I prepared for the two of us to go to waste.”

“You think I’m going to eat with you? Now?”

Hannibal affirms with a nod and forces aside the crippling disappointment that threatens to consume him.

“Would you rather I kill you? This was meant to be a pleasant evening before you attacked me, and I am nothing if not a good host.”

Will laughs in shock, but doesn’t move to get up from the floor, still watching Hannibal cautiously from where he’s resting.

“Dare I ask whom will be on the menu tonight?” Will baits, but the words don’t hold the fire they might once have. Hannibal allows the sudden fondness he feels to manifest as a smile. At least he can have this; a fleeting moment of nostalgia.

“I don’t feel much like eating,” Will says softly rubbing a hand over his still-red jaw.

“I am afraid my appetite has left me as well. However, a meal is as much about company as it is what is prepared.”

Will watches him, but the distrust in his eyes fades quickly to resignation.

“There will never be a time I am not angry with you.” Will says softly, pulling himself to his feet. “We talk, you say your piece, and you will leave. Understand?”

Hannibal wants to argue, to tear Will apart and rebuild the man into something familiar, something that doesn’t remind him of his own failures. Instead he holds out a hand, inviting Will to return the gesture and shake in some parody of a truce. Will obliges, like his hands had not, only moments ago, been wrapped around the column of Hannibal’s throat with the intention of killing him.

“There are really only three ways this can end.” Hannibal tells him when they separate. 

“I know.” Will replies, and opens the kitchen door to whistle for Hallie to come back inside.

“Do you really want me to leave?” Hannibal asks, watching the way the breeze from the open door ruffles Will’s unruly curls.  

“You know I spent a year trying to reconcile why I felt so connected to you? In the beginning, before the false accusations and attempted murder. You treated me like I wasn’t something dangerous,” Will keeps his back to Hannibal as he speaks and breaks to chuckle lamely. No mirth is to be found in the sound. “And I liked it. I felt loved. Like I was worth more than my psychosis. We both know better now, I think. Even if Chilton has convinced you that you’re some pining schoolboy with a crush.”

Hallie comes bursting through the doorway, a half-chewed stick clenched between her teeth, and runs past them both toward Will’s bedroom. Somehow simultaneously breaking and reinforcing the tension between the two of them.

“You know me, Will,” Hannibal offers. “Perhaps better than anyone living. Do you really believe that I would go to such great lengths if my affections for you were not genuine?”

“I believe that you believe you love me.” 

“And I believe that you are projecting your own insecurities onto me. I am not so far gone as to recognize the moral conflict that must accompany the knowledge that you are attracted to an individual who has done irreparable physical and emotional damage to yourself and innumerable others.” 

Will stays with his back to Hannibal, and Hannibal takes it upon himself to engage the other man; grasping at an opportunity he may never possess again.

“They auctioned off my home, my clothing, my books, my art.” Hannibal says softly, moving to stand flush behind Will and resting a hand gently on his shoulder. “My personal drawings are displayed as the sensationalist works of a madman. My storied existence has been reduced to the shock and awe of my crimes. In exchange I gained some level of infamy, but the only true remnant of my former existence, Will, is you.”

“I should kill you,” Will says quietly, leaning back into the touch. “For everything you’ve done to me. Everything you’re going to do to me.”

“What happens next is entirely up to you.” Hannibal murmurs into Will’s hair, moving his hand from Will’s shoulder to his neck, drawing a finger gently along the man’s jawline. “Though I would like to possess you once more.”

Will makes a noise low in his throat and turns to face Hannibal, any semblance of reluctance slipping quickly away.  Hannibal leans in, pressing his lips to Will’s temple and breathing in the acrid tang of sweat, musk and cheap conditioner.

“I don’t have a choice in this. Not really.” Will murmurs, hooded eyes hinting at a cunning mind Hannibal is only too pleased to engage. 

“My dear Will,” Hannibal answers, pressing his lips to the hollow of Will’s throat, warming the smooth skin with his breath before sliding his hand beneath Will’s untucked shirt to palm at the scar the symbolizes so much of the history between them. “You never had a choice. You’ve always been mine.”

 

* * *

 

“You know, it took a while,” Will starts, inching a hand low to tug Hannibal’s shirt from his jeans; he shivers slightly at the unintended contact, Will’s nails drawing teasingly across the skin of his abdomen. “For me to understand. I had to crawl out of the Ripper’s mind and into yours,“

“Was there ever a difference?” Hannibal says breathily, leaning into Will and ghosting his lips over the man’s neck.

“The Ripper was a persona in a game you played with the world, at least until you sussed out what you really wanted.”

“Is that so?” 

Hannibal drops a kiss to the snared flesh hidden beneath Will’s jawbone, mouthing the skin gently as Will’s fingers rise to lace through his greying hair. Despite the intimacy of the action, Hannibal can sense how dangerously close to violence they both are; Will still determining if Hannibal is deserving of the recompense he wants so desperately to mete out, and he himself acknowledging that the fantasy he has entertained for so long may be nothing more than just that. 

“Once you found me, you were obsessed. Weren’t you, Doctor Lecter?” Will asks, voice husky.

“You were unique.” 

“You’d never seen anything like me before, had you? Someone who was as intelligent as they were damaged; 'malleable' you said? Someone who could understand your motivations without obscuring the meaning behind your work. You were obsessed.” Will punctuates the statement by palming Hannibal through his jeans and he responds by digging his teeth firmly into the meat of the juncture between Will’s neck and shoulder. Not hard enough to break skin, but with enough pressure to remind his partner just who is in control.

“This is what you wanted, right? In the end?” Will whispers, voice tight and breathy as Hannibal runs a tongue over the quickly reddening indentations his teeth have left behind. “To have me like this, in your arms, beneath you,” Will slides open Hannibal’s zipper and works a hand beneath the waistband of his briefs, gripping his growing arousal in hand tightly, stroking a thumb slowly along the shaft. “To fuck me. _Claim me_.” 

Will takes one of Hannibal’s hands in his own, the one not intently working to bring him to orgasm, and presses it to his bare abdomen, over the pale line of scar tissue that remains the only evidence that Hannibal had ever truly cared for him.

“That night,” Will says, voice hot, not relinquishing Hannibal from his hold. “You would have killed me as soon as taken me to bed.” Will’s hand begins to move more quickly, fingertips stroking over the moist head of Hannibal’s erection. “You were courting me. If I hadn’t figured it out, you would have fucked me, and you would have told me yourself. About all the things you’ve done,” Hannibal feels the first tight hints of orgasm coiling through his lower abdomen. “All the people you’ve _killed_.”

It’s too much, too pleasurable a sensation to be wasted on petty accusations and fully-clothed fumbling. He pulls his hand from Will’s grip and clasps the man’s jaw firmly. Will stills immediately.

“I still plan on taking you, dear Will. Fucking you until you cannot move, ripping your release from you as violently as I tore open your flesh.”

“I’m looking forward to it,” Will breathes, releasing his grip on Hannibal’s member. “But there’s something I have to do first.”

“Of course,” Hannibal agrees, ducking his head into the hollow of Will’s neck. “What do you need from me?”

The air between them is hot when Will pulls back, eyes bright with a life Hannibal has not seen in a very long time.

“You are stunning,” Hannibal breathes, gladly meeting Will’s unobstructed gaze. “I do care for you, Will.”

Hannibal leans in once more, pressing his lips to Will’s softly, attempting to express the adoration and affection he knows himself incapable of healthily conveying. “I love you,” Hannibal whispers, and for a moment he is whole once more. After years of captivity, he can safely say that in this moment he wants for nothing.

Nirvana lasts only a breath before white-hot pain blossoms across Hannibal’s face, stinging his eyes and the cry that is pulled from his throat is wholly involuntary. Through a haze of red he can barely focus, tears clouding his vision; but when he can see again there is only Will, an almost serene smile adorning the man’s shattered lips.

The hand that only moments before had teased Hannibal to the brink of ecstasy now tightly grasps a short, crimson-stained paring knife. 

“You’ve claimed me,” Hannibal says, wincing as the movement pulls at the torn flesh of his cheek. Will doesn’t respond, and Hannibal knows without question that the other man understands implicitly the meaning behind his words.

“I know,” Will says, his voice neither kind nor mocking, as he motions to Hannibal’s face with the blade. “That’s why I did it.”

“You broke me,” Will tells him, the words an echo of their earlier conversation, dropping the blade on the counter with a _thunk._ “And I think it’s only fair I get the chance to return the favor.” 

 

 

 

___________________________________________________________________

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

 

**_Epilogue_ **

 

The early-morning light dances across Will’s naked chest and Hannibal follows the slowly shifting patterns with deft fingertips.

“I think it’s time,” Will murmurs keeping his eyes shut against the dawn and arching into Hannibal’s touch. “You should kill me. Make it grisly.”

“Should I devour you? Filet you?" He punctuates each question with a kiss, trailing down Will’s chest before reaching the silver-white line of scar tissue that stretches from Will’s pelvis to his ribcage and laving his tongue over the skin possessively.

"Grill you? Stuff you?” Will hisses at the sensation and rolls to the side, the thin sheet pulling away as he scrambles for the nightstand.

“Personally, I quite like the idea of being stuffed.” Will mumbles before muffling his laughter in his pillow. 

“Stuffed,” Hannibal echoes, nuzzling the exposed small of Will’s back before nipping softly at the flesh. “Give me your phone.”

Hannibal dials quickly and waits, propping himself up on an elbow and mentally accounting for the difference in time zones. When the drolling automated ring stops abruptly, with a growled _‘Crawford’_ Hannibal smiles down at Will, who has turned to watch the ensuing conversation.The residual swelling from Will's latest round of reconstructive surgery has finally dissipated, but Hannibal can still see the scarring in his mind's eye. He doesn't know if he will ever be able to look at Will and not see the damage. 

“Jack. It’s been so long since we’ve had a nice chat.”

_“Put Will on the phone.”_

“I am quite afraid that Will won’t be doing much speaking in the near future. He was not as cooperative as I had hoped he would be. Certain measures had to be taken.” 

Hannibal runs the knuckles of his free hand across Will’s unscarred cheek, and the younger man reaches up to mirror the gesture, fingertips lingering over the pale scar that stretches from the bridge of Hannibal’s nose to the edge of his hair line, offering a displeased frown in return before mouthing _‘don’t bait him’_.

“Where is the fun in that?” Hannibal counters softly, a palm pressed over the receiver and barely catching Jack’s biting demand of, _“What have you done?”_

“Do you remember that evening several years ago where you and your lovely wife joined me for dinner, and we indulged in a _superb_  veal cutlet? Well, it has come to my attention that the creature was not euthanized as humanely as I was led to believe, but I am planning on employing a more reliable butcher and attempting the dish again.”

Hannibal casts a glance to Will, who in return is regarding him with an indignant stare.

_“What have you done with Graham?”_

“Now, Jack, I am graciously offering to supply the meal for our little reunion, and all you can think about is poor Will. I have about sixteen hours before I make the state line, so, shall we say seven tomorrow evening for dinner?”

_“What have you done to Will?”_

“Your persistence is quite unnecessary. Dear Will is going to be our guest of honor. In fact, he’s so angry I ruined the surprise I had to leave him to, how should I put this, ‘stew in his own juices’ for a short while. Don’t worry, I’m sure he’ll have softened up quite nicely by the time we next meet.”

Will makes a face and Hannibal can’t keep a smile from edging into his tone as he draws his hand lightly across Will’s chest, tangling his fingers playfully in the light dusting of hair he finds there.

“Seven, Jack. If your dear wife is still breathing, she is welcome to attend.”

Hannibal hangs up and Will watches him with no small amount of levity. 

“‘ _Stew in my own juices_ ’?” Will asks, resting his cheek on his forearm. “Years of planning and that was the best you could do?”

Hannibal tosses the phone aside and pins Will beneath him, pressing a thigh firmly against the other man’s growing arousal. Through the open window, the bells of St. Mark's Campanile ring, grounding and certain.

“I assure you, that man is not worthy of my best.” Hannibal chides, voice low and taunting as the ringing subsides. “You, however, are worthy of much greater effort. Now, I believe there was some discussion of stuffing?”

 

 

 

  ** _End_**

 

* * *

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it. That's all she wrote. Thank you for sticking by me all this time, and thank you for reading, reviewing and recc'ing this fic to your friends and followers. I appreciate all your kind words and your patience.
> 
> I love all of you, and I'll see you back here for Season 2.
> 
> onawingandaswear.tumblr.com

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [PODFIC: A Robin Redbreast (In a Cage)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1605767) by [Entity_Sylvir](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Entity_Sylvir/pseuds/Entity_Sylvir)




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